Emily Lowe, Public Healthican

Emily Lowe is an unlikely sleuth when she is asked by her boss to quietly investigate the deaths of seven children.

It's January 1920, and the spunky Lowe has been assistant to the director of the Bureau of Child Hygiene at the New York City Department of Health for only a few months.

She is determined to make a difference in a case that has the department befuddled and desperate to halt a new infectious disease before it spreads through the Big Apple. Lowe has no background in this area, few leads in the Jewish immigrant community where the tragedies occurred, and is squarely in position to fail. But the precocious woman enlists the help of seasoned public health investigator Edward Morelli. Together, the duo races against the clock in a bustling city teeming with possible suspects. What endures is Lowe's heroic pride in being able to declare herself a "public healthican."