Murder can happen on Mars too. The sudden death of a Martian census worker sparks a murder investigation on the red planet-and everyone is a suspect. To clear his name, janitor Herbert Hoover Palminteri must dredge up the long-buried secrets of his college days as a member of a notorious secret society, the Order of the Scepter and Gavel, where he was witness to scandal and tragedy in an initiation prank gone wrong. As the investigation unspools, Herbert is swept up in an interplanetary conspiracy that proves you are never safe from your secrets-especially in the confines of Mars.