Western Mystery

Authors of over 200 books combined, William W. and J.A. Johnstone write action-packed tales of Western life. In Rampage of the Mountain Man, a job offer to deliver 3,000 head of cattle sounds like just the payday Smoke Jensen needs. But when an angry Cheyenne warrior attacks him and his comrades, Smoke discovers that he's not the only one looking to cash in.

The last thing Ruby McGavin thought she would be doing after her husband, Cole, died was meeting his family. He had claimed his relatives were all dead, and she didn't know him long enough - they were only married one year - to think otherwise. But it turns out that members of Cole's family, from a small ranch town in California, are very much alive, and they show up on Ruby's doorstep with the news that she has inherited some land from her husband.

In 1893, Otto "Big Red" Amlingmeyer and his brother, Gustav "Old Red," find themselves in a situation that they never expected: they have a bit of money and time to do something other than scramble. It's enough to confound even that most unconfoundable of men, their mutual inspiration, Sherlock Holmes.

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.

Before he set down his pen, seven-time Spur Award winner Elmer Kelton—the Western Writers of America’s “Best Western Writer of All Time”—cut 50 notches on his gunbelt of classics. In this final novel of the Texas Rangers, a young lawman finds his mettle put to the test while bringing justice to a remote settlement. To stop a series of baffling killings and thefts, newly married ranger Andy Pickard is dispatched to a central Texas community where locals are quick to pin the crimes on two feuding cattlemen.

A historic western that opens in 1873, a time when recession is forcing thousands westwards to recoup their fortunes. The West is tough, brutal and the Indian is the enemy. But when a white woman is raped, it is a half-breed Cheyenne who comes to the rescue. From the author of Jake and Upland Passage.

Margaret Coel’s spellbinding Wind River mysteries have long celebrated the spirit of the American West. When Kiki Wallowingbull is found dead on the reservation, all signs point to a drug deal gone wrong. Arapaho lawyer Vicky Holden and Jesuit priest Father John O’Malley begin an investigation into the murder, but soon find themselves spiraling toward a deadly world of drugs and deceit.

Screenwriter, actor, producer, and award-winning author Andrew J. Fenady knows the Western genre as few do. Destiny Made Them Brothers follows General Ulysses S. Grant, George Armstrong Custer, and Rebel Johnny Yuma, united by fate and friendship. The elusive one of the bunch, Johnny plays a vital role in Grant’s victory for the Union, Lee’s surrender at Appomattox, and Custer’s deadly campaigns in the West.

In 1946 a young couple is brutally murdered in the East Texas town of Cold Springs. Now—34 years later—rumor has it that the sole suspect in these murders has returned. While the response to this report ranges from giddy excitement to vile loathing, another dead body turns up.

USA Today best-selling author William W. Johnstone built a reputation for crafting unmatched stories of true Western courage - a tradition J. A. Johnstone now continues. In A Rocky Mountain Christmas, Matt Jensen’s scenic trip on the Denver railway is derailed when an avalanche strikes the train. Far from an accident, its cause is a reckless band of outlaws out to free their leader. Surrounded and outgunned in a driving snowstorm, Matt must lead to safety a ragtag group of survivors that includes a senator’s sick daughter and a beautiful woman with a dark past.

Kent Conwell combines murder, mystery, and the lure of the West in The Last Way Station. Jake Slade and his partner, Three-Fingers Bent, arrive in a small Texas town with plans to start up a stagecoach way station. But when Bent is accused of murder, Slade's got to find the real culprit before his friend's day in the gallows arrives.

When Mexico's bloodiest predator invades the reservation, it's up to Charlie Yazzie and his friends to take charge the Navajo way. Navajo can track prey, but can Charlie, Thomas, and Harley Ponyboy catch the killer before he catches them?

Reeling from the news dropped on his desk days earlier, Sheriff Elven Hallie is left questioning everyone and everything in his life. But when a former deputy is burned to death, Elven must push aside the turmoil in his personal life to catch the killer. As if that wasn’t enough, new faces from the Starcher clan enter his county with vengeance in their eyes for Corbin’s death. Paranoid, angry, and directionless, Elven must lean on those closest to him to bring a ruthless murderer to justice. But that’s easier said than done when it’s those closest to him who he trusts the least.

Harney County, Oregon, 1968: Nick Drake has a chest full of medals and enough demons to fill a duffel bag. He's been trained to kill but was never retrained to rejoin society. Drake flees to the lonesome high desert in search of redemption and takes a job patrolling wildlife refuges where the only conflicts are keeping out stray cows and ticketing poachers. But then he stumbles across a girl's body ritually placed in a gully. Her murder is only the beginning, and Drake must face humanity's heart of darkness once again if he's to stop a killer from turning even more gullies into graves.

After fastball phenom Prospero Stark's baseball career craters in a Mexican jail, he retreats to a trailer park in the scorching Arizona desert. He lives in peaceful anonymity with a collection of colorful outcasts until someone leaves his former catcher's severed hand on his doorstep. Beautiful, hard-living reporter Roxanne Santa Cruz, who keeps a .380 Colt and a bottle of Chivas in her car, joins Stark to help him uncover his friend's fate, a dangerous pursuit that pits them against a ruthless gang of drug-dealing killers.

Phil Sundeen thinks Deputy Sheriff Kirby Frye is just a green local kid with a tin badge. And when the wealthy cattle baron's men drag two prisoners from Frye's jail and hang them from a high tree, there's nothing the young lawman can do about it. But Kirby's got more grit than Sundeen and his hired muscle bargained for. They can beat the boy and humiliate him, but they can't make him forget the oath he has sworn to uphold.

Sheriff Zeb Hanks has his hands full when sociopath Jimmie Joe Walker, recently released from an Arizona state prison, masterminds a devious plan to make himself filthy rich. His plan involves Ángel Gomez, a down-on-his-luck half Mescalero Apache/half Mexican. Ángel's alcoholism and far-fetched dreams make him an unwitting dupe in Jimmie Joe's plans, which end up endangering Ángel's own life, as well as the lives of those he loves.

Ron Hansen has won an Award in Literature from the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters for his rich writing and poetic style. Atticus begins in the vein of a contemporary western. As it unfolds, it includes an intriguing murder mystery and a dramatic parable of the prodigal son. For years, prosperous Colorado rancher Atticus Cody has tried to understand his rootless son, Scott, who is now living a marginal life in Mexico.

In the year 1833, two young brothers journey into the Wild West to seek their fortune; little do they know they're embarking on the adventure of their lives. Expecting to stumble upon riches as they make their way westward, sixteen-year-old Dillon Griffith and his older brother Owen instead encounter hardship after hardship in the form of Indian raids, bloodthirsty villains, robbery, and kidnapping. Packed full of riveting action, gore, and vengeance, Deadville paints a thrilling - and historically pristine - picture of life in the Old West.

When their wagon breaks down in the desert, Reverend Jon Keyes and his ailing wife, Lorna, find themselves at the mercy of blistering heat, punishing thirst, and circling buzzards. On the brink of death, they are rescued by Caleb Hobbs and his beguiling daughter, Deliverance, who take them to their home in San Melas. It's a strange little town, built to resemble the New England village they left behind.