On the wintry Tuscan coast, the wealthy elite retreat to their lavish holiday homes. But the season turns sinister when a couple vanishes from a locked villa, and the body of a disreputable count washes ashore, bludgeoned to death. With echoes of Agatha Christie and the erudite suspense of Umberto Eco (or it could be White Lotus taking on the Berlusconi era) this richly atmospheric mystery unfolds among an ensemble of eccentrics: a fraudulent aristocrat and his beautiful companion; a melancholic academic and the woman he adores; two elderly single ladies consulting ominous Tarot cards. With the local police floundering, it falls to the brooding Signor Monforti to unravel the mystery, triumphing as an amateur detective.