Andy Kinyon grew up in Palo Alto, California. At the young age of 22, he became the top national salesman for the publisher of LOOK Magazine in 1965. That same year, he befriended notable figures like Ken Kesey, Owsley Stanley, and Jerry Garcia, among others. He soon turned on, tuned in, and dropped out. Andy was among the first to join the counter-culture movement in Haight-Ashbury. He worked for Bill Graham and Chet Helms, conducting psychedelic light shows for the likes of Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, Jim Morrison, and many others.

In 1968, as the Haight-Ashbury neighborhood spiraled into chaos, Andy relocated to North Beach. His penthouse apartment became a hub for famous and not-so-famous people alike. Unfortunately, tragedy struck in the early morning hours of January 22, 1972, when he was found dead on the stairwell of his residence at the corner of Grant & Green Streets. Andy, who was only 29 years old, had been stabbed in the heart and neck, then had his gut and throat slashed. The killer -or killers- were never brought to justice.

Over the next four decades, the San Francisco Police Department (SFPD) refused to let the victim's family access any evidence related to the case. The lead detective even lied to the family about key facts and never revealed the prime suspect's true identity. The SFPD continues to deceive and obstruct the truth about the crime to this day, dedicating more time and effort to their cover-up than their so-called investigation.

In 2010, Andy's son, Jon Kinyon, took on a 12-year-long private investigation into his father's murder. Through iron-willed determination and relentless sleuthing, he tracked down long-lost witnesses, discovered disturbing facts, and dug up long-buried evidence. Jon's work ultimately forced the SFPD to finally name the prime suspect as "the person responsible for the death of Andy Kinyon" and close the case.

This book is not a typical cold case story or a tale of police corruption. It is a "true-crime memoir," as James Ellroy calls it, a deeply personal account of the investigation, as well as a universal commentary on the pursuit of justice. This tour de force sheds some light on the earliest days of the hippie movement in the Bay Area, as well as the workings of the shadowy San Francisco Crime Family (also known as the Lanza Crime Family: a La Cosa Nostra crime syndicate), providing some information that has not been widely known or published before.