Native Mystery Fiction

A man is murdered in Seattle's Pioneer Square. The killer is caught just blocks away, blood still on his hands. When it's discovered that both killer and victim belong to the same Native American tribe, the tribe asserts jurisdiction, and homicide DA Dave Brunelle has to prosecute the case in their tribal court. It's bad enough when the defense attorney claims the killing was justified under the ancient custom of "blood revenge". It gets worse when blood revenge turns into a blood feud.

When Nora’s best friend, a film director, dies in a hiking accident, Nora suspects foul play. Could a controversial film project have played a part? Intent on finding out, Nora struggles to piece together the truth. What she finds is shocking. What is the connection between a secretive polygamist sect, Native American lore, one of the world’s richest men, and her own mother’s surprising past? Her race to weave together these seemingly unrelated threads leads Nora into harm’s way.

Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls is relevant in the news today, rightfully so with the staggering statistics of racism, indifference, and the lack of historical pursuit for justice. This novella is fictionalized accounts of what our Native American women and girls lived through and died by the hands of assailants of all backgrounds that think indigenous women are invisible.

When tribal police officer Bernadette Manuelito arrives to speak at a program for at-risk teens, she discovers chaos. Everyone is concerned about a beloved instructor who went out into the wilds of the rugged lava wilderness bordering Ramah Navajo Reservation to find a missing girl. The instructor vanished somewhere in the volcanic landscape known as El Malpais. The instructor's disappearance mirrors a long-ago search that may be connected to a case in which the legendary Joe Leaphorn played a crucial role.

Hazel Lesage never expected it to be her. Then again, she didn’t plan on becoming an unlicensed PI, helping the 'throwaway people.' However much has changed in Amiskwaciy, the problem of poor Indigenous women and girls being expendable hasn't. Nobody else is going to help the Augusts find out who killed their daughter Nell; so Hazel takes the case. And then she takes the dog. What follows will force Hazel and her family to confront the question of what it means to be Human, and what it matters to be Humane.

In this fast-paced sequel to the highly acclaimed Navajo Autumn, Charlie Yazzie and Thomas Begay encounter danger and intrigue on the nation's largest Indian reservation. Old and new characters emerge to unravel ongoing corruption in the upcoming Patsy Greyhorse murder trials, and an irascible Ute family and their shrewd ranch-woman neighbor become caught up in the plot to place certain tribal leaders above the law.

They are just about as bad and evil as outlaw gangs come. But in the end, they finally go straight.

Andy Adams (1859-1935) was born to pioneer parents in Indiana, worked in Texas for a decade driving cattle, and settled in Colorado Springs, where he penned his cowboy narratives. The Log of a Cowboy chronicles a five-month drive of three thousand head of cattle from Brownsville, Texas, to the Blackfoot Indian Reservation in Montana. This classical work of fiction provides fascinating insights of everyday life on the Great Western Cattle Trail with a team of 12 cowhands, a cook, a horse wrangler and a foreman.

An unexpected death on a lonely road outside of Utah’s Bears Ears National Park raises questions for Navajo Tribal Police officers Jim Chee and Bernadette Manuelito. Why would a seasoned outdoorsman and well-known paleontologist freeze to death within walking distance of his car? A second death brings more turmoil. Who is the unidentified man killed during a home invasion where nothing seems to have been taken? Why was he murdered? An illicit business, a fossilized jaw bone, hints of witchcraft, and a mysterious disappearance during a blizzard add to the peril.

The seventh novel in the acclaimed Sean Stranahan mystery series: Scarecrows are appearing in the cliffs above the Smith River in Montana, and state investigator Harold Little Feather is trying to discover the culprit leaving the hay figures in the cliffs, with signs painted that read "No Smith River Mine - Not on My Watch." The event is related to a copper mine project that threatens the river, but his investigation takes an ominous turn when a little girl claims that a scarecrow chased her in the night.

A snowmelt has sent floodwaters down to the fields of the Red River Valley, dragging the body of an unidentified Native woman into the town of Ada. The only evidence the medical examiner recovers is a torn piece of paper inside her bra: a hymnal written in English and Ojibwe. Cash Blackbear, a 19-year-old Ojibwe woman, sometimes helps Sheriff Wheaton, her guardian, on his investigations. Now she knows her search for justice for this anonymous victim will take her to the White Earth Reservation, a place she once called home.

The residents of Alaska’s largest national park are stunned by the death of one of their oldest members, 87-year-old Old Sam Dementieff...even private investigator Kate Shugak. Sam, a lifelong resident, dubbed the “father” of all of the Park rats - even though he had no children of his own - was especially close to Kate, his niece, but even she is surprised to discover that in his will he’s left her everything, including a letter instructing her simply to, “find my father".

Alaska aviation entrepreneur Finn Grant died in the fiery crash of his Piper Super Cub. Someone sabotaged his engine, and virtually everyone in southwestern Alaska has a motive, including his betrayed wife, his bullied children, and Liam’s wife, bush pilot Wyanet Chouinard. With few places to turn, Liam asks his former mentor Niniltna post commander Sergeant Jim Chopin, for help, and Jim quickly brings Kate onto the case. Working undercover as - of all things - a waitress at Bill’s Bar and Grill, Kate learns over beer and burgers that Grant’s business had expanded meteorically over the last two years.

A lost and frightened horse plods down the National Mall, startling the crowd. When Gabriel Du Pré spots the confused animal, the connection is immediate, for neither of these creatures belongs in the sweltering heat of a DC summer. Du Pré, a Métis Indian from the wilds of Montana, calms the horse and leads it to the nearest policeman. Du Pré is in Washington to play his people’s music for a Smithsonian festival, but after leading the horse to safety, he encounters a murder instead.

On the banks of the Missouri River, the town of Yellow Earth and the Three Nations reservation prepare for an invasion - the ground beneath their feet is loaded with readily frackable shale oil and the minions of corporate energy are rushing to extract it. Tribal Chairman Harleigh Kildeer welcomes Big Oil with open arms, while county sheriff Will Crowder has to deal with the overnight influx of roughnecks, truckers, drug dealers, and sex workers.

An icy chill foretells a harsh winter for the Navajo people—and for perpetually down on his luck Harley Ponyboy the situation grows increasingly desperate. What evil is this that dogs his every step? When a lucky lottery ticket comes his way, Harley uses the new resources to search for a lost love—only to find she has fallen to appalling depths. His stubborn resolve to help puts him on a collision course with her abusive companion . . . and with his own mortality.

À la fois roman historique et thriller, 1542: La colonie maudite s’inspire d’un fait réel aussi fascinant que méconnu : l’expédition Cartier-Roberval. Bien qu’aux prises avec la montée des troubles religieux en France, François 1er doit assurer son emprise en Amérique. Il ordonne donc à Jacques Cartier et au Sieur de Roberval d’aller fonder une colonie en Nouvelle-France. Un étonnant amalgame de catholiques et de protestants, ainsi que de repris de justice et d’aristocrates, s’embarque alors pour une formidable épopée.

Joe Leaphorn may have retired from the Tribal Police, but he finds himself knee-deep in a perplexing case involving a priceless artifact - a reminder of a dark time in Navajo history. Joe’s been hired to find a missing biil, a traditional dress that had been donated to the Navajo Nation. His investigation takes a sinister turn when the leading suspect dies under mysterious circumstances and Leaphorn himself receives anonymous warnings to beware - witchcraft is afoot.

In Agatha Christie’s short story “The Mystery of Hunter's Lodge”, Poirot and Hastings are enlisted by a Mr. Roger Havering to help investigate the murder of his aristocrat uncle at his hunting lodge. Hastings discusses the murder with the housekeeper on the scene, but Poirot quickly deduces that her story doesn’t add up.

For four generations, the Messmers have raised cattle in the rough country of eastern Montana. When the current owners die in a motor home accident, they leave the ranch to their son - an ominous development for everyone in the area, both human and bovine. Larry Messmer left Toussaint in the 1980s, when he got in trouble for bludgeoning a horse to death, and Gabriel Du Pré hoped he would never come back. Larry announces his return by having his ranch hands kill every weak cow on the property.