It's the end of the summer season in a small seaside town. Just as its residents are looking forward to a slower pace, their lives are disturbed by a catalogue of strange appearances and disquieting events. Craig Norton, publisher's assistant with an interest in the paranormal, arrives to visit his aunt. He's on a quest to end a fifty-year-old curse issued by a servant of the Brethren of the Visiting Spirits. He enlists the help of Tara, the beautiful and voluptuous manager of the Beach View Hotel. But what is the significance of her role? A couple fall in love against a background of missing and reappearing people, death, destruction, and the haunting chimes of an ice cream van. What happened in the old Empire Ballroom all those years ago? And can a reoccurrence be prevented?