When rookie private eye Nica takes on a mysterious case, she enters a world of multiple dimensions called Frames, where buildings and lawn chairs can be sentient, a stray cat has great powers, books can be killers, and clouds can be spies. At home, Nica tackles missing person cases, while in the larger reality of the Frames she is swept into an escalating battle with stakes that could not be higher.

Now that Nica has a taste for life in the Frames - the endless multiple dimensions so bogglingly like yet unlike our own - she can't wait to get back to work with the allies in the fight against Maelstrom. Being Nica, she applies her detective skills to solve problems she hasn't been asked or permitted to tackle. Meanwhile, the universe prepares for war. In the New Yorks are Frames of such power that the land imparts strange partial sentience to all, and Nica's roster of allies includes old pals and recent comrades plus local beings, landforms, and structures, notably a self-help book, a river, and a street musician with an unfathomably dark past.