The Secret of Sooty Wick Inn is about eleven-year-old Beetle Beane. She senses and notices things most adults do not. Before her parents leave on a mission to rescue critically endangered spiders from imminent extinction, they send her to spend a week in Maine. Beetle finds herself under the care of Murtha Bellwether, a mysterious hunting guide and owner of an old ramshackle inn. Soon after Beetle arrives, she sees something she shouldn't have and decides to find the truth behind Murtha's secret.