Red Mesa

Book Description

Navajo Police Special Investigator Ella Clah is on the run. Justine, Ella's cousin and fellow officer, disappeared after the two women argued publicly over Justine's new boyfriend. Human bones are discovered at the spot where the younger woman had told her family she and Ella were to meet late one night. Suddenly Ella Clah, cop, is Ella Clah, murder suspect. Stunned by Justine's death, Ella has no time to mourn. Her former allies in the Navajo Police Department and the FBI are hot on her trail, using techniques she taught them to hunt her down. Ella has to find the real killers--and fast--before the Dineh act on a growing belief that Ella's mother, brother, and young daughter have become evil.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly If it's tough being a cop, it's even tougher being a cop's relative, as shown in this fifth fine mystery about Navajo Tribal Police Special Investigator Ella Clah. In previous books (2000's Shooting Chant; etc.), we've seen Ella's father murdered, her mother almost killed in a car crash and brother Clifford also seriously threatened. This time out it's Ella's younger cousin and assistant, Officer Justine Goodluck, who has to suffer for being related to the star of an ongoing series. Not only does the troubled, increasingly unreliable Justine wind up dead on the titular New Mexico mesa, but Ella becomes the prime suspect in her grisly murder. Despite the possibilities for melodrama, the Thurlos maintain a firm hold on reality with convincing details of life and speech patterns on what Ella calls "the Rez"--the sprawling Navajo settlements around Shiprock. Although the heavies behind Justine's murder are introduced early, with ominous music on the soundtrack, the reasons for the plot against Ella are satisfyingly complicated as they unravel. And the moments that single mom Clah steals from her work to spend with her 18-month-old daughter, Dawn, are poignantly rendered. (Apr. 11)Forecast: This book should benefit from the release in March of the mass market edition of Shooting Chant, as well as from the strong reviews garnered by that title and from blurbs by Tess Gerritsen and Diana Gabaldon about previous Thurlo books. Handselling to readers who find the wait between Tony Hillerman books too long should also boost sales.

Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Library Journal Ella Clah, special investigator with the Navajo Tribal Police (Shooting Chant), splits her time between cases and her toddler daughter. A recent puzzling convenience-store robbery, an enigmatic e-mail warning, a vengeful outlaw on the loose, a newly assigned Hopi FBI agent, and Ella's strange-acting police partner all underscore Ella's own intuitive sense that something bad will happen. When it does, she stands accused not only of murder but also of fulfilling a well-known family curse. The authors deliver an intense, spellbinding family drama in which the battle between good and evil affects both modernist and traditionalist Navajo. Prime reading for fans of Tony Hillerman and other Southwestern mysteries. Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.