<p>Ever since <i>Bootlegger's Daughter</i> stormed the mystery awards in 1993 Margaret Maron's Deborah Knott novels have won a dedicated following. Readers love her wise and witty heroine intriguing plots and charming southern country settings. <i>Home Fires</i> offers all this and more as it tackles one of the contemporary South's most burning issues. </p><p>When racial tension erupts in the sleepy community of Colleton County North Carolina Deborah is caught off guard. She is happily tending her own home fires: her simmering romance with Kidd Chapin the house she's building on her family's land and her campaign for reelection as district judge. But then the first black church is burned and all of Deborah's alarms go off.