Can clown-colored mushrooms be behind the gruesome murders? At eight, David Austin witnesses the savage murder of his brother in the fields behind his house. Amnesia protects Dave from remembering what happened, and the police are left with few clues and no solid suspect. The community has its own theories of who the killer is: an itinerant madman, a pedophile, a disturbed friend. A farmer blames multicolored, psychedelic mushrooms that suddenly appeared in a nearby forest. When a wolf ingests the spores and attacks the farmer, his chickens, and his dogs, he knows it’s the evil fungi. Dave copes with dreams, headaches, and anxiety as his brain begins to remember. At college, there’s more of everything: alcohol, weed, and sleep visions. And each dream brings a new revealing memory to the surface. After a ten-year hiatus, the murderer strikes again, and Dave senses it. He sees the current murders, the victims mutilated faces, and panics. His enigmatic girlfriend warns him not to go, but Dave, at last, seeks psychiatric help, and a lost face comes to him. The crisis comes when teenage campers are slain near the spot of his brother’s death. Hoping to kindle memories by visiting the site, Dave dares to return to the Clown Forest. He must talk to his brother’s friend, a man with his own psychological problems but who may know what happened. His return to the hometown alarms friends, his childhood psychiatrist, officers who hadn’t solved the case, and especially the killer. The killer knows it was a mistake to let the young Dave escape, that memories do not stay repressed, and that there is but one way to preserve his secret. Dave will find answers in the dark woods, promises the farmer, who offers to guide him, show him the lost face, and name the killer. But it has to happen at midnight. What Dave finds may identify the murderer. If it is the truth and he survives.