In Beyond the Pale we meet artist Emily Quinn, a middle-aged woman involved in a marijuana smuggling operation to support her painting carreer. Initially attracted by the money and the idea of adventure, Emily discovers another side of her personality when assuming a different identity for her job. Drawn to the men she is working with, Emily finds herself in an erotic triangle of love, sex and danger.
Mastermind Adam Kinkaid is a brilliant, handicapped black man who rejects the notion of love and dares Emily to explore the meaning of passion. Youthful Michael is handsome and well-built but cannot engage her intellect. Driven ever deeper into dubious behaviour, Emily wonders how far she is capable of plunging. When she decides to extricate herself from the situation, matters get out of control.
Set in Vancouver and California, Beyond the Pale is a sexually charged and riveting page-turner that grapples with ideas of art, love and eros. Elizabeth Rhett Woods's complex characters are both believable and outrageous. Beyond the Pale is a highly readable novel exploring a woman's precarious balance at the edges of society, in search of the authentic self.

Elizabeth Rhett Woods is a poet, novelist and author living in Victoria, BC. Her most recent volume of poetry is The Absinthe of Desire published by Ekstasis in 2004. Beyond the Pale is her second novel. Her first, Yellow Volkswagon, was published in the 1970's and is a Canadian fiction classic of the time.