Writer Kenneth Magee has bet that he can finish a story at rural resort Baldpate Inn, now closed for the winter. The owner has given him the "only" key to the front door. But there are six other keys, and peculiar characters, some of them up to no good, keep turning up as the mystery deepens.

High school students led by the Girl and Boy turn from Christianity toward secret atheistic meetings. When a girl is accidentally killed by a stairway collapse, the Girl and Boy go to reform school where they are treated brutally.

US Marshall Vance is assigned to rid the Oklahoma Territory of outlaws.

A night club owner takes on the crooks who killed his best friend.

John and Mary Sims are city-dwellers hit hard by the financial fist of The Depression. Driven by bravery (and sheer desperation) they flee to the country and, with the help of other workers, set up a farming community - a socialist mini-society. The newborn community suffers many hardships - drought, vicious raccoons and the long arm of the law - but ultimately pull together to reach a bread-based Utopia.

Dick Tracy investigates the theft of a fortune of fur coats, a possible insurance swindle and several murders, all linked to a huge thug who wears a hook in place of his right hand.