Tasked with an assignment to manage the construction of a prison on a remote Appalachian mountaintop, Tucker Mason sees an opportunity to restart his life past the death of his wife and the recurring demons of his childhood. But strange occurrences at the house that he rented on Bright's Mountain and the suspicion of drugs being smuggled through the prison construction site create distractions that lead to violence, intrigue, and his own imperilment. Struggling under the weight of loss and guilt, he encounters a world that he never knew existed in the shadow of the emerging prison. With a unique perspective on the human condition, Beyond the Higher Ground takes its reader through a historical glimpse of Southwestern Virginia to a powerful exposition of the drug crisis that has devastated the region and the abject brutality of those who deliver it.