Each story in Arrest Me (before I write again) focuses on a single startling event, such as a cop at loose ends after being shot on duty, or a suburban woman's interference in a neighborhood crime scene. These four short stories are about people forced to face a grim truth - that their chaotic, sometimes criminal existence has come about through their own hand, and only they can choose whether to reverse the pattern.

All Elle wants is a little land to call her own. And she has earned it, finding a measure of peace on a lonely isle near the bottom of the Florida Keys. But others have their own designs, especially Billy, her deadbeat, absent husband who could show up any time to claim her or maliciously destroy what he cannot have. In 1935, as Labor Day approaches, a storm is brewing that will alter Elle's life and the landscape of the Florida Keys forever. How far will Elle go to protect the little that she has? And if she does the unimaginable, can she keep her freedom? In the great depression of the...