Andrew knew he'd never have a chance with Clare when he fell in love with her as a college freshman. Clare was in a steady relationship and kept Andrew in the "friend zone" throughout their four years of college. Except for one failed attempt to express the exquisite nature of his feelings for her, Andrew buries his feelings deep in his soul, hoping the day would come when he'd try to tell her again.
After graduation, Andrew leaves his small Northeast hometown of the South Amboy and heads to Key West, which he thinks might be a good place to "get over" Clare. Although he finds steady employment working on highway maintenance, he and a co-worker moonlight as a musical duo and call themselves The Overseas Highwaymen. When they add two younger elite musicians, Andrew becomes the improbable leader of one of South Florida's hottest tropical rock bands.
Beautiful yet insecure Clare McGovern grew up in the foster care system, which caused her to endure one temporary living arrangement after another. She does not know why her parents gave her up as a newborn, but she longs to find out. Clare aims to make her adult life more stable than her childhood by marrying Jason Rinaldi. When that marriage fails, Clare moves in with Sam, the soon-to-be-divorced owner of the South Amboy Marina Café, and she quits her teaching job to work at Sam's waterfront restaurant.
One evening, Clare encounters a peculiar customer who predicts she is about to have a "transformative experience." Although she has no idea what this fellow is talking about, Clare finds his pronouncement unnerving. Near the end of her shift, she collapses and becomes comatose with what doctors later diagnose as a deadly form of bacterial meningitis.
After being rushed to the hospital and placed on life support, Clare's spirit emerges from her physical body and visits Andrew's home on Lower Sugarloaf Key, where it looks like Andrew is the only mortal who can see and communicate with Clare. Clare brings Andrew up to date on her life since graduation and tells him about her grim medical situation. Their reunion does not last long before Clare disappears into a vaporous mist.
Accompanied by his friend, Robin, a relationship psychic (aka Lady Nadia), Andrew puts his music career on hold and returns to South Amboy to visit Clare's physical body and see if there is anything he and Robin can do to help. The next time Clare appears to Andrew, she asks him to locate her biological mother before the doctor "pulls the plug." As Andrew and Robin race against time to fulfill Clare's wish, Andrew questions whether there is some other purpose for his soulful connection with Clare.
Jerry Smith's South Amboy, USA challenges readers to redefine whatever boundaries they may have placed on their most intimate relationships.
