Jeannie's marriage is slipping away as fast as her friend Batya's sanity, and she can't seem to put on the brakes.
Jeannie, a social worker at a psychiatric hospital, considers her friendship with Batya problematic but can't desert her. Meanwhile Jeannie's coworker, the zany psychiatrist Jack, becomes Batya's secret lover, and Batya and Jack take on a crusade against the "shady side of psychiatry."
Their battle clashes with hospital administration--an administration Jeannie's rich husband and father support through managed funds she doesn't quite understand.
Family ties to the managerial elite and secrets Jeannie isn't privy to lead to scrutiny when authorities start investigating issues at the hospital. An outside inquiry turns up questions about drug approval, the hospital's relationship with pharmaceutical companies, and its resistance to any corporation dealing with marijuana research. When everything goes wrong, Batya suffers a complete mental breakdown, and a body turns up in the sea next to the hospital.
What other secrets lie in the psychiatric institution? Author Michael Benjamin, a retired Israeli psychologist, questions his profession in Sins and Lovers, a morality play hidden in the guise of a murder mystery.
