Jake Horn was on the dodge for a crime he didn't commit when the town of Sweet Sorrow took him in and rewarded him with a badge he didn't want. Still, this out-of-the-way Dakota hellhole is a good place for a man to get lost in.

Sheriff Dan Rhodes investigates a murder that may or may not be related to a recent wave of emu-rustling. For an officer of the law, Blacklin County, Texas, used to be pretty peaceful, but now, what with the emu-rustling, cockfights, and protests at the new Walmart store—not to mention murder—the sheriff has his hands full.Hit hard by the collapse of his little hardware store, Elijah Ward has taken to chaining himself to the Walmart doors and generally making a nuisance of himself. And when Lige's dead body turns up, floating down a river in a portable toilet, Rhodes finds he has quite a case to investigate. What was the connection between Lige and chickens? Lige and the Palm Club?And was he involved in the area's emu thefts? It seems that raising emus is a booming business, so much so that emu are being stolen left, right, and center by would-be emu ranchers with little respect for the law. From theft to murder, the local crime spree seems unstoppable. But with a little help from the computer foisted on him by aging deputies Hack and Lawton, plus some good old-fashioned detective work, Rhodes just may be able to straighten out his county.

Lizzie Randall, the preacher's daughter, is murdered. The men of the west Texas town are set on lynching Paco Morales, a Mexican teenager who happened to be in the vicinity at the time. No proof, but, after all, he is only a Mexican. Reason and/or conscience work on most of the would-be lynchers, so that, in the end justice is served. The list of suspects grows to include almost everyone in the story, thus providing an agreeable tangle of clues. 

Business ain't easy when the locals stand to lose it all.“Molly conceived a resentment against the rich cattleman who could impose such restrictions and embitter the lives of poor people. And as for Traft's tenderfoot nephew, who had come out of Missouri to run a hard outfit and build barbed-wire fences, Molly certainly hated him."Although he doesn't know cattle or cowboys, Missourian Jim Traft finds himself as the foreman of a tough Arizona outfit tasked with fencing a hundred miles of open cattle range. Brought on by his wealthy uncle, he faces this difficult trial with youthful aplomb.But Traft faces a community that stands to suffer because of this new drift fence, and he must walk a fine line in order to honor his uncle's business while not incurring the wrath of longtime residents. The Drift Fence shows how this tender young man struggles to overcome the odds he faces and ultimately wins over the heart of the beautiful young lass, Molly...

"I can just imagine the questions in history," Fox said. "Who was our first president?' 'Who was known as The Great Emancipator?' Things like that. Come to think of it, maybe the second one's too hard. But you get the idea!" "Yeah," Burns said. "I get the idea." Hartley Gorman College, in Pecan City, Texas, is hardly a bastion of serious scholarship. The little Baptist school is more in¬terested in shielding its students from the evil influence of The World, The Flesh, and The Devil than in turning out future Nobelists. But its staff, by and large, is worthy of a more demanding institution; they are victims of a glutted market in Ph.D.s and they do the best they can. So it is they who are most upset at Dean Elmore's "secret plan" to award credit hours for "undirected study" by "independent scholars"—in plain words, to turn the school into a diploma mill. Which may be why Dean Elmore, shortly after unveiling his plan, is found blud-geoned to death at his desk. It is certainly why, at his funeral, there is not a wet eye in the house. Or so observes Carl Burns, Hartley Gorman professor of English literature, through whose eyes we see both the crime and the larger picture of this wacky denominational Texas school. Those readers familiar with Bill Crider's books about Sheriff Dan Rhodes of Blacklin County, Texas, knows how wryly witty this author can be; here the humor is revved up a few notches, and the resulting account of Elmore's murder, Sheriff "Boss" Napier's investigation, Bums's well-meant meddling, and the people and doings at Hartley Gorman are the exactly-right mix of realism and wackiness to make the book a delight as well as a suspenseful mystery.

Jack Hare is an Easterner who has come west for his health. In Salt Lake City he is mistaken by Dene's outlaw gang for a spy and must flee the town to escape them. He is found suffering from exhaustion and exposure in rough country by the wealthy Mormon rancher August Naab. As he is nursed back to health at Naab's ranch, Hare becomes aware that Naab's holdings are being threatened by both Dene's rustlers and an unscrupulous Gentile land-grabber named Holderness.Hare also comes to know Mescal, originally an orphan of a Spanish father and Navajo mother, taken in by Naab and promised in marriage to his eldest son, Snap. August Naab does not believe in violent resistance to Holderness's incursions. To save Hare from Dene and his gang, Naab has him accompany Mescal to his sheep camp, located in an isolated valley fastness, and it is there that the two fall in love, even though Mescal knows that she is morally bound to marry Snap Naab.Packed with adventure, action, emotion,...

Sequel to Victoria, Bride of Kansas....Maggie has an unexpected suitor—in a red suit.Schoolteacher Maggie O’Brien comes home for Christmas on a mission--to gather toys for orphans living on poor farms in Kansas. She's made her list, but there's no Santa in sight. Not until a local shopkeeper volunteers his services.Gordon Sumner sets his mind on winning the black-haired Irish beauty, but Maggie’s brother is his fiercest competitor, and O’Brien’s loyal sister gives him the cold shoulder. Undaunted, he comes up with a clever plan.Maggie sees through the fake Santa’s ploy, but with Christmas just around the corner, she’s running out of time to make the holiday happy for needy children. She accepts his help—with a plan of her own. She’ll play matchmaker and find her persistent suitor the perfect bride. 

From the bestselling author of Riders of the Purple Sage, comes another classic Western tale.The sun set across the purple sky over the Don Carlos Rancho while the warm Santa Fe breeze rustled through the grazing fields just off the trail. The Colonel sat on his porch, staring over the whole scene, pondering the seemingly-doomed future of his prized cattle ranch. “Another spell with my heart like this last one will kill me," he said nervously to his right-hand man, Britt.Afraid it would break her, the Colonel kept his condition from his alienated daughter, Holly—who was shipped off to boarding school in the East at the tender age of eight. The Colonel would settle for nothing less than the best education for his daughter. Not to mention, the West—crawling with outlaws, thieves, and greed—was no place for a naïve, young woman.However, in the wake of the Colonel's death, Holly is forced to return and take the reins of her father's...

The Taken By Cowboys series features ripped billionaire Cowboys, tanned rugged ranchers, a curvy heroine and steamy ménage romance! Jess Jones is sick of her stressful life in New York City. Desperate to escape life in the city, visits a guest ranch in Wyoming and is quickly introduced to two handsome cowboys that work on the ranch. Two cowboy hunks? Jess is in for two times the trouble!