For Every Season by Frankie J. Jones is the story of Andi Kane, a woman with an unfulfilling job and a difficult relationship with her partner, Trish. On the day that she gets a call from her grandmother with a mysteriously urgent message to return to her family home, Andi finds herself layed off from her job as a manager for a telephone company. The next day, the unfeeling Trish, throws Andi out of the house, leaving Andi with a feeling of insecurity that we later discover has been with her all her life.

Andi decides that, with little prospects for a job in a city that she has always disliked, she will return to her childhood home in San Antonio. Upon her arrival, her grandmother pulls her aside at the first opportunity and tells her that she needs her to solve a mystery. When her grandmother was a child, Andi’s great-grandfather was convicted of killing a man, a crime that her grandmother is convinced he didn’t commit and she charges Andi with the task of proving it. At first Andi protests, but then she decides to just try to see what information she can discover before giving up the undertaking. All the while, jobs in San Antonio don’t seem to pan out for Andi, nor does her search for the ideal place to live seem to materialize.

The novice PI spends most of her time in the sleepy town of HiHo, where her family once lived and where the murder took place. The more she digs, the more she is convinced that her grandfather was guilty. Although she feels terrible about having to give the news to her grandmother, she doesn’t see how she can prove anything to the contrary. Yet every time Andi is ready to give up, another morsel of information seems to fall into her lap, beckoning to look for more.

While digging for information in HiHo, Andi discovers several other things. First, that HiHo has an unusually large lesbian population. Second, that the District Attorney, the lovely Janice Reed, is also lesbian—and interested. However, as the plot proverbially thickens, twists and turns, Andi and Janice cannot seem to get past their differences over the old case to allow them to succumb to their obvious attraction. To top it all off, Andi realizes that her mother is vehemently opposed to her snooping around the ghosts of HiHo, for she has painful, difficult memories of a childhood taunted by cruel children who pointed her out constantly as the descendant of her criminal grandfather. The link between these childhood memories and Andi’s relationship with her mother begin to give Andi some insight and healing.

For Every Season was a 2006 Golden Crown Literary Society award finalist. In it, Jones has given us a charming, well-written tale that is both entertaining and mysterious. Not only will the reader want to find out if Andi’s great-grandfather really did murder George Zucker, but she will also be sitting on the edge of her seat to find out if Andi ever really finds a job, a home and a life-long companion.