THE PALMETTO HOUSE is an80,000-word work of upmarket fiction set in 1973 coastal Florida.

When rising reporter Juniper Mae Daniels returns to Bulow Creek, Florida to care for her dying stepmother, she intends to stay only long enough to put her family’s affairs in order. But the marsh she grew up in is no longer familiar.

Her ten-year-old brother pulls up a trap with the native blue crabs stained an unnatural pink. Locals whisper about a carnivorous mist. And when a body washes ashore, rumor begins to look a lot more like warning.

Juniper’s reporting instincts lead her to a disturbing truth: the estuaries surrounding Bulow Creek have been quietly poisoned for decades.

As she investigates, she uncovers a pattern of illness—miscarriages, birth defects, unexplained deaths—that may be tied not only to a military-backed operation, but to her own mother’s disappearance years earlier.

The closer Juniper gets to exposing what’s happening, the more dangerous the pursuit becomes. Powerful local figures with ties to the operation make it clear that speaking out will come at a cost not just to her, but to the only family she has left.

As the truth closes in, Juniper must decide whether to protect her brother and preserve the legacy of The Palmetto House, or risk everything to bring the story to light.