Clean up – or cover up?
“The twisty follow-up to the Hillerman Prize–winning The Territory, featuring tough smalltown Texas police chief, Josie Gray.” – St. Martin’s Press/Thomas Dunne Books
It was pure luck Josie Gray spotted Cassidy Harper’s car, abandoned on the side of the road. If she hadn’t, then she’d never have found Cassidy, lying nearly dead of heatstroke in the desert sand beside the body of a Mexican immigrant. But Cassidy can’t explain why she was out for a walk in the midday desert heat, let alone how she happened upon the corpse. With the coroner’s speculation that the sores may put all of Artemis in danger, the stakes are high for everyone.
Advance Praise for Scratchgravel Road
“Full of nonstop action … Fields’s second crime novel will be a sure hit with mystery fans who miss the late Hillerman and readers who love contemporary Westerns.”
—Library Journal (starred review)
“As in Fields’ Tony Hillerman Prize–winning debut: carefully integrated red herrings, a tinge of romance and dead-on descriptions of West Texas weather—oppressive heat, weeklong downpours and earth-obliterating mudslides.”
—Kirkus Reviews
“Noteworthy for the delineation of the west Texas desert country and the well-drawn cast of characters; Josie Gray is a protagonist worth following.”
—Booklist
“Fields sounds a warning on industrial dangers and their wide-ranging effects on ordinary people in this engrossing follow-up to her Hillerman Prize–winning debut, The Territory.” … “A tense climax with a flood, mudslide, explosives, and a possible murderer add to the suspense.”
—Publisher’s Weekly
A thin strip of land
along the Rio Grande
where two countries collide
Winner of the 2010 Tony Hillerman Award for Best First Mystery
What sacrifices would you make to triumph over evil?
Would you sacrifice love? Your home? Would the risks be worth the payoff?
Chief of Police, Josie Gray, becomes a personal target for the Medrano Cartel and puts the town she vowed to protect at risk. How does an understaffed border town cop face a brutal organization with infinite resources and win?
About Tricia
“I fell in love with the southwest in the 80’s after reading Edward Abbey’s, Desert Solitaire. While having never lived in the desert, I have spent years there in my mind, drawn to authors such as Tony Hillerman, Elmore Leonard and Larry McMurtry. Over the past ten years I’ve been drawn as well to the story in northern Mexico: the spread of the cartels, the chaos along the border, the inability of local and national authorities to gain control, and the destruction of lives on both sides of the border. Juarez, Mexico, just across the border from El Paso, Texas is now considered to be the most dangerous city in the world. It is terrifying, and it is on our doorstep.”
If you have questions feel free to email using the address below. I look forward to talking with you!
