What happens when a literature teacher channels her inner
Nancy Drew to break an inmate out of America’s most famous prison?
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San Quentin Exodus
by Bill Smoot
Genre: Historical Literary Fiction, Crime Drama
James, a still-water-runs-deep boy, struggles to navigate
the rough streets of Oakland, California, in the 80s. His only friend is a pit
bull he rescues from dog fighting. On the cusp of college, James commits a
crime that results in a prison term of thirty to life.
Allison, a young Indiana girl obsessed with Nancy Drew
novels, vows that her life’s mission will be to solve mysteries and help
people. Introverted yet daring, Allison moves to Berkeley to teach prep school
and volunteers as a tutor at San Quentin. She meets James when he is
approaching fifty, learns his story, and after his parole denial, channels
Nancy Drew to plan his improbable escape.
San Quentin Exodux is a braided novel about two people whose
lives cross in a quest to reset an ill-fated life. It is a story infused with
misfortune and pain, but also with hope and a fierce humanity.
“San Quentin Exodus, Bill Smoot’s deeply compelling
novel, introduces readers to the world of prison but really to the much bigger
world of his characters’ lives, inviting us to follow the trajectory of each as
it unfolds with surprise and mystery, love and loss. Like all good
literature, San Quentin Exodus ultimately asks us to reconsider
everything we believe—or think we believe. Smoot is the consummate storyteller:
restrained, wise, compassionate.”
—Lori Ostlund, author of Are You
Happy?
In one week Allison Anderson will commit her first felony: section 4550 of the
California Penal Code, helping someone escape from a state prison. Almost
everyone who knows her would be stunned with disbelief. For her, it’s the
ultimate realization of who she is.
One autumn evening six years ago, Allison entered San
Quentin Prison as a volunteer tutor. Walking across the prison grounds, she
gazed at the forty-foot walls, the spirals of razor-wire,
and the imposing guard towers. She wondered how an inmate might escape. It was
her first time in a prison, and the question engaged her problem-solving mind.
She did not know that
one day she would devise an escape plan. She did not know that she would put
that plan into action. At the time, it was just a thought experiment, a
challenge for a woman whose childhood heroine was Nancy Drew, girl sleuth.
Allison’s most vivid memory of entering the prison that
evening was the birds. When she and her group rounded the hospital building and
walked across the yard, she saw geese and gulls scratching the ground on the
baseball field. It was mere minutes before the October sun would set, and their
white feathers glowed like gold. A single goose stretched his neck, dipped his
thick body, and with a push from his feet and a flapping of his great wings, he
rose from the ground and glided across the field, then soared over the wall.
Other geese did the same, their necks piercing the air like arrows. Sea gulls
followed. The walls and guard towers were mere landmarks below them, like trees
or outcroppings of rock, obstacles they cleared with ease. They didn’t need an escape
plan. They had wings.
The First Day and the Last
They
say that the two days of prison an inmate remembers most vividly are his first
and his last. Everything in between is a blur. James’ first day was 30 years
ago. His last—maybe—will be in one week. If Hemingway’s character could walk
away from war, James can declare his separate peace from prison. It’s time to
move on, regardless of what the parole board has ruled. It’s necessary. An
absolute must.
For society, James is a statistic, another Black man
languishing in prison, costing the state $75,000 a year. His escape—if it
succeeds—will save taxpayers money. For himself, it will be his personal
exodus, his promised land of another chance at life. If things go according to
plan, no one will know how he did it. He will just disappear, a man become a
ghost. Allison is a smart young lady, and he can’t find any flaws in her plan,
but he is haunted by that old saying: If it seems too good to be true, then it
probably is.
James is filled with yearning and fear. The greater danger
is not that he’ll get caught and have time added to his sentence—though that’s
a real possibility—but that the hope he’s allowed himself to feel will die.
That’s the greater risk. The loss of hope he could not bear.
He lies in his bunk, trying to conjure up positive images.
The thought of freedom makes his skin prickle. The shadows of the bars cross
his body, spill onto the concrete floor. He listens to the cell block tick with
sound, as if the walls are straining to breathe. He imagines a sea gull soaring
on the wind.
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Bill Smoot grew up in Maysville, Kentucky, and attended
Purdue University where he was editor of the campus newspaper, The Purdue
Exponent. Fired as editor by the university president, he was reinstated after
protest from students and faculty. He went on to graduate school at
Northwestern University, where he received a PhD in philosophy. He has taught
for four decades at levels ranging from sixth grade to university students. He
currently teaches courses at Mount Tamalpais College at San Quentin and the Osher
Institute for Lifelong Learning at UC-Berkeley. His essays and short stories
have such publications as Ninth Letter, Crab Creek Review. The Nation, Literary
Review, Crab Orchard Review, Western Humanities Review, Narrative, and
Salon.com. His the author of Conversations with Great Teachers and a novel,
Love: A Story. Mr. Smoot currently lives in Berkeley, California, with his dog
Artemis. His website is https://billsmoot.net
Publication date: June 28th 2026
Genres: Historical
1126. The Norman conquest grips Wales. Rebellion stirs. And one woman’s choice could ignite it all.
Nineteen-year-old Angharad, the daughter of a Norman knight and a captive Welsh princess, arrives at Aberteifi Castle for her mother’s arranged marriage. But her new stepfather, the merciless Norman commander of the castle, has other plans. He demands that Angharad expose her mother, Nesta, as a secret rebel or be cast out to die.
To survive, Angharad presses Nesta to reveal the truth about her past: as a Welsh princess stolen by invaders, the victim of wars and betrayals, the seductress of kings and princes. As Nesta’s story unfolds, Angharad discovers a legacy more dangerous than she could have imagined, and must decide whether to protect her mother or herself…
In 1066, Duke Guillaume of Normandy, known to the English as William the Conqueror, won the Battle of Hastings and was crowned King of England.
In 1087, the Norman barons began their invasion of Wales.
By 1126, after countless deaths amongst the thorn-infested hills, swamps, and forests, the Normans had managed to subdue all five Welsh kingdoms. More or less.
Chapter 1. HOMECOMING
All Hallows’ Eve, 1126. West Wales
When the castle loomed out of the hailstorm above her, Angharad was careful not to crane her head upwards in awe as her Norman guards did. Her mother had commanded her to uphold her dignity, no matter what, so she kept her back straight and sat rigid in her saddle. Although the steepness of the hill made her feel as if spikes of ice were being hurled down at her by the castle itself, she didn’t cower. She pretended not to hear the guards cursing about having to drag a pair of heathen women out of the Welsh wildlands. She alone would be her mother’s last, unfailing support.
Angharad’s mother, Nesta, rode alongside, her imperious glare fixed on the track ahead, ignoring the water that streamed from her claw-black hair onto her horse’s flank. Even dressed in threadbare travelling clothes, Nesta didn’t look like the prisoner she was, finally recaptured by the Normans after three years of threats, bribes, and attempted ambushes. She didn’t look like a new bride either, although she was bound to marry the Constable of the castle; the contract had been sealed. No. What Nesta looked like, in the arrogant line of her jaw, in the resolute set of her flawless face, was what she was born to be.
Royalty.
During her nineteen years of life, Angharad had been reminded daily that her mother was the last living princess of Deheubarth, once the most renowned of the Welsh kingdoms. Angharad’s bloodline was the only wealth she possessed; she must look the part.
‘Amongst wolves,’ Nesta had said – and many wolves lived in the cloud-draped forests of these lands – ‘you can tell the leader of the pack from the way he draws every eye towards him. My father looked like a king from two arrowshots away, even when he was wounded from the endless wars, even when he was starving and freezing and caked in mud. Whatever fate we meet in this castle, I refuse to grovel before them. Hold your head high, Angharad. We must not disgrace the memory of our glorious ancestors.’
Luckily, deception was one of Angharad’s talents: Nesta had trained her in it since she was a child. Angharad had the skill of appearing haughty whilst at her most powerless.
When Nesta dismounted on the crest of the hill, Angharad copied, stifling a wince at the cramp in her thighs. Sixty miles they had travelled from the open meadows where they had spent their years of sanctuary amongst the Welsh: a journey of three days and nights, riding and walking through a wasteland of swamps and brambles, the Norman guards watchful behind them, bloodhounds running at their flanks to warn them of rebels and outlaws, with every hamlet full of hostile eyes and nothing to buy and almost nothing to steal. But here they were, at last.
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About Author Claire Fuge:
Claire Fuge writes historical fiction inspired by medieval Wales, the Tewdwr family and the women whose lives were shaped by conquest, loyalty and survival. Her work explores the spaces where history leaves silence, and where storytelling can bring forgotten voices back to life.
Deadly Ruse: A World War II Mystery (Deadly Series) by Kate Parker
Deadly Ruse: A World War II Mystery (Deadly Series) Historical Cozy Mystery 14th in Series Setting – England Publisher : JDP Press Publication date : June 23, 2026 Number of Pages ~300 Digital ISBN-13 : 979-8993886442 ASIN : B0GYQCS43C Paperback will be available on the release date.
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As the war’s outcome shifts, deception is an art–and survival depends on who’s painting the picture.
When British spy Olivia Redmond is summoned again by her elusive spymaster, she’s expecting danger–not an invitation to teach drawing to captured German generals at Trent Park House. But beneath the genteel cover of sketches and civility lies a deadly ruse: the lavish POW mansion is wired for sound, every whispered secret a weapon in Britain’s intelligence war.
Among the prisoners is Oberst Bernhard, a conflicted German officer from Livvy’s past. When murder, stolen jewels, and a suspected plot among the prisoners ignite within Trent Park, Livvy must decide whom she can trust–and how far she’ll go to expose a truth wrapped in loyalty and lies.
From the candlelit salons of wartime espionage to the shadows of betrayal, Deadly Ruse is a gripping historical mystery where every stroke of trust could be fatal.
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About Author Kate Parker
Kate Parker has long wanted to build a time travel machine. However, after several false starts, she gave up and created time travel by going back in time inside her books. Since she’s fond of murder mysteries, it is probably best that all of her travel is inside books or police from various ages would be hunting her. When not recreating old time buildings and fashions, she can be found with a modern computer and modern air conditioning in North Carolina with her daughter and a 115 lb. puppy who could just crash through any time barrier.
A Soul on Trial: A Marine Corps Mystery at the Turn of the Twentieth Century
By Robin R. Cutler
Category: Adult Non-Fiction (18+), 365 pages (442 with back matter) Genre: Literary Non-Fiction, History Publisher: View Tree Press Release date: May 20, 2026 Content Rating: PG +M: The M rating is because the book is about whether or not a young man committed suicide. There is a brawl and an autopsy described in detail but minimal violence, no sex no abuse, adultery or abortion.
Book Description:
Secrets, Spirits, Scandal, and a Nation Watching A murder mystery, ghost story and courtroom drama from the Progressive Era
The death of a young Marine Corps lieutenant in 1907 creates a sensation when his mother, his sister, and his ghost challenge the Navy’s suicide verdict.
A Soul on Trial is the true story of an unprecedented conflict between democratic values and military justice in the age when the modern mass media was born. It is also a tale of the power of the press a century ago, and of the lives of young officers whose private battles were often as challenging as their professional ones. After her son died under mysterious circumstances in 1907, Rosa Brant Sutton came 3000 miles from Portland, Oregon, to challenge the Navy’s suicide finding. Inspired by her Catholic faith and several alleged postmortem visits from her beloved “Jimmie,” she embarked on a crusade to save his soul from the stigma of a mortal sin– a sin that would keep him out of heaven.
Rosa’s spiritual journey soon became a political one that would take her through the corridors of power in Washington, D.C., to a courtroom in Annapolis, and, finally, face-to-face with Jimmie’s corpse in Arlington Cemetery. This book also explores the values of a proud and honorable Marine Corps forced into the center of public discourse by Rosa’s uninhibited pursuit of justice. The Corps’ brilliant judge advocate, Henry Leonard, already a combat hero at thirty-three, was the perfect foil for Mrs. Sutton, her renowned attorney, and America’s relentless reporters when the naval inquiry opened in Annapolis in 1909. By then, millions of Americans had a stake in this confrontation between a patriotic mother and her own government in a military forum. Rosa’s story was irresistible to Progressive Era journalists and high-ranking military officials who joined with members of Congress in a search for verifiable truth that played out on a national stage. In order to save her son’s reputation and defend her own sanity, Rosa ultimately turned to James Cardinal Gibbons, the highest official in the American Catholic Church, and Dr. James Hervey Hyslop, America’s foremost psychical researcher. Hyslop commissioned a detailed field study of her paranormal experiences as part of his research on whether or not the dead communicate with the living. With the press corps as a catalyst, these two men helped Rosa achieve an American brand of justice, as well as redemption both for Jimmie and for herself.
As H. Michael Gelfand wrote in the Journal of American History,A Soul on Trial explores “one of the most remarkable cases of a civilian challenging the power of the U.S. military in American history… [and it is] a testament to the power that one ordinary individual can wield when determined to seek justice.” Plus, “. . . it is narrative history at its finest.”
Historian, filmmaker and blogger, Robin Cutler’s early life was split between Manhattan and a farm in rural Virginia. An only child, she never felt like one because of the menagerie collected by her mother, Jane Hall, a former screenwriter at MGM. Robin’s siblings included a rescued ocelot, German Shepherds, farm cats, snooty cats, and a screech owl (Sidney), who could not fly but travelled on Eastern Airlines in a modified Nantucket basket.
Robin decided she wanted to be a historian in the ninth grade. Highlights of her career include working for the National Endowment for Humanities, co-producing an Emmy-nominated dramatic series for PBS, collaborating with several Native American tribes to chronicle their histories and culture on film and video, and publishing three nonfiction books. She discovered the extraordinary story told in A Soul on Trial in family papers. She was astonished that Rosa Sutton’s effort to learn the truth about her oldest son’s death created a national sensation between 1907 and 1910. Although Rosa was convinced Jimmie’s ghost came to her several times, he has never visited Robin. Rosa was Robin’s great grandmother.
Vivian Kelly has finally created a home and a family at the glamorous speakeasy known as The Nightingale, where no one cares who you are in the daytime. After all, in the underground world of 1920s New York City, everyone has a secret to keep, and they’re on the Nightingale’s dance floor to leave those secrets behind. But sometimes it takes more than a dance to escape your past.
When a stranger from Chicago shows up at The Nightingale looking to settle old scores, Vivian and the Nightingale’s owner, the mysterious and alluring Honor Huxley, send him packing. They soon discover, though, that the stranger was just a warning. Slowly, the people who have made The Nightingale their home realize that someone is following them. Hunting them. And that someone won’t stop until they unravel a mystery that’s been cold for years: a missing girl, a boy out for revenge, and a truck full of cash that disappeared in a job gone horribly wrong.
Vivian just wants to protect the people she loves, and she’s willing to dig into the dirt of the past to make it happen. But some questions are safer left unanswered, and now that Vivian has built a family for herself, she has more to lose than ever before.
Now experience this Edgar Award–nominated historical mystery in paperback!
Praise for Last Dance Before Dawn:
“A lively, sprawling crime story that captures the vibrancy of the Roaring ’20s.” ~ Kirkus Reviews
Book Details:
Genre: Historical Mystery
Published by: Minotaur Books Publication Date: May 26, 2026 | Paperback Number of Pages: 350 ISBN: 978-1250325822 Series: The Nightingale Mysteries, Book 4 || Amazon, Goodreads, Macmillan Publishers
Everyone came to the Nightingale looking for something.
They didn’t have much else in common, the folks who snuck down the alley toward a single electric light that flickered like it had been forgotten for years and could burn out at any moment. You never knew who would whisper the password at the door under the light, who would make their way through the midnight velvet curtains that muffled loud laughter and louder jazz.
Maybe your family could have bought half of Fifth Avenue, or maybe you couldn’t even buy new shoes. More likely, you lived somewhere in between, with work that paid your bills and the hope, one day, of something a little more. At the Nightingale, it didn’t matter who you were in the daytime. If you could hold your booze and let loose on the dance floor and keep a secret for a stranger, you were in.
They came looking for excitement, for the thrill of breaking a law that no one liked anyway. They came to dance and drink and maybe find a new friend, the sort of friend who—¬ after a glass or three of champagne—¬ would meet them in a quiet corner to get a little bit friendlier. They came because they loved the music, the way it curled through the air and carried them across the floor, the way the singer’s voice filled the room and made their hearts ache. They came for the party. They came to escape. If they were lucky, they could pretend that whatever waited for them back at home didn’t exist. They could lose themselves in the music and the arms of someone new. They could feel free, even if it would never last, because in that moment nothing mattered but the next dance, the next drink, the next hour. If they were lucky, they found what they were looking for, and they left before trouble could find them. But not everyone was lucky. *** Vivian recognized the sound of danger before she even realized what she was hearing. Twilight had settled on the city, humid and heavy and speckled with the glow of streetlamps. She and Beatrice Henry—¬ Beatrice Bluebird, as she was known at the Nightingale, where she sang six nights a week—¬ moved through it with the practiced carefulness of two women who were used to navigating New York’s streets alone. Their steps were quick, but their eyes were quicker, always on the lookout for a man who might be trouble or a cop who might be trailing them. The Nightingale paid off the police weekly, like any other dance hall or juice joint. But everyone who worked there knew to be wary just the same. It was that wariness that sent a prickle of warning down Vivian’s back when they were two blocks from the Nightingale’s back entrance. “Bea—¬ ” Vivian tossed out a hand to stop her friend in the middle of the sidewalk. A few steps ahead of them, a cat yowled as it ran out of a narrow alley. “You hear that?” For a moment, the only sound out of the ordinary was the distant grumble of thunder. Then Vivian heard it again. “Look a little closer, pal.” The voice was low and menacing, snaking out of the shadows and clearly not meant to be overheard. “I want to make sure you and me is on the same page.” “Viv—¬ ” Bea hissed, but Vivian couldn’t help herself; she took a step forward, just enough to peek down the alley. Halfway down the narrow stretch of filthy brick walls, two men were just visible in the fast-¬ fading light. One had his back against a wall. He was the taller of the two, but he still shrank back from the menacing bulk of the second figure. That one loomed toward him, his wide shoulders cutting off any escape as he shoved some kind of paper toward the nervous man’s face. “—told you, when I have something, I’ll let you—” The menacing man shoved him against the wall, the gesture nearly careless enough to hide the violence of it. The voice broke off with a grunt of pain, but it had been enough. Usually, Vivian would have stayed far away from anything that sounded like a beating and wasn’t her business. But she recognized that voice. “Don’t interrupt,” the menacing man snarled. “My boss don’t take kindly to rude fu—” “It’s Spence,” Vivian hissed. Bea tried to pull her away. “It’s not our business. We can tell Silence or Benny,” she whispered, naming two of the bruisers who worked at the Nightingale keeping customers—¬ and anyone else who needed it—¬ in line. “They’ll come handle it.” “That’ll take too long.” Vivian shook her head, pulling away from Bea’s cautious hand and running down the alley toward trouble. “Hey! Leave him alone!” The bruiser barely glanced over his shoulder at her, just cocked his fist back and drove it, almost casually, into the nervous man’s stomach. He doubled over, heaving and gasping for air, as his assailant tipped his hat mockingly. “We’ll be seeing you soon, boyo. You can count on it.” He was gone before Vivian could reach them. She stood, panting and staring at the gap between buildings where he had disappeared. A drizzling rain began to fall, plastering her hair against her cheeks. She wasn’t dumb enough to go after him. “You okay, Spence?” she asked instead, turning toward the remaining man as he braced his hands on his knees. “Swell,” croaked the Nightingale’s second bartender, a lanky, mouthy, handsome grump. “What the hell are you doing here?” “Apparently chasing off the fella who was about to beat you to a pulp,” she said, stung. Spence had been working at the Nightingale all summer and still hadn’t managed to endear himself to any of the other staff. But Vivian had expected at least some gratitude. Instead, he scowled at her like she was the one who had just punched him in the stomach, not the one who had run the attacker off. “But no need to say thanks or anything.” He hauled himself upright, wincing. “I had it handled, you know,” he said, still sounding resentful. “I didn’t need a rescue.” “Sure you did, pal,” Bea said, joining them at last. “That was a stupid thing to do, by the way,” she added, glancing at Vivian as she opened her umbrella and held it over both their heads. “Be glad he didn’t have a friend waiting to beat the stuffing out of you too.” “My stuffing’s doing just fine,” Spence groused, pushing his wet hair off his forehead and straightening his jacket and tie. “What was that about?” Vivian asked, laying a hand on his arm. “Spence? Are you in trouble?” *** Excerpt from LAST DANCE BEFORE DAWN by Katharine Schellman. Copyright 2025 by Katharine Schellman. Reproduced with permission from Katharine Schellman. All rights reserved.
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About Author Katharine Schellman:
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Katharine Schellman is an award-winning author of historical crime fiction, including the Nightingale Mysteries and the Lily Adler Mysteries, whose work has been called “worthy of Rex Stout or Agatha Christie” (Library Journal). Her books have been nominated for an Edgar and a Silver Falchion, and she has won a Zibby Media National Book Award for “Best Book for the History Lover.” A former actor, onetime political consultant, and graduate of William & Mary, Katharine lives and writes in the mountains of Virginia.
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Death of a Proper Bostonian (Old Los Angeles) by Anne Louise Bannon
Death of a Proper Bostonian (Old Los Angeles) Historical Mystery 6th in Series Setting – Boston, 1873 Publisher : Healcroft House, Publishers Publication date : June 12, 2026 Digital ISBN-13 : 978-1948616539 ASIN : B0GMLGMMGM
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A deadly homecoming
It’s August 1873, and at long last, physician and winemaker Maddie Franklin Wilcox makes the journey home to her beloved native Boston. Her business is to deliver her ward and apprentice, Elena Ortiz, to the local women’s medical school, and that also includes visiting her father, her sister and her family.
But at a dinner with the family of Maddie’s late and very much unlamented (at least, on her part) husband, young John Wilcox, a cousin there to entertain the guests with his nature talk, is shot. Then the next morning, the eldest of the Wilcox brothers is found shot in his bed. Maddie quickly concludes that the shooting of the oh, so charming naturalist was but a distraction for the shooting of her former brother-in-law.
Chased by a corrupt Boston police officer, confronted again and again by the relentless prejudice of the city’s medical practitioners, and in danger of losing her heart to young John Wilcox (who had plenty of reasons to want his cousin dead), Maddie’s happy homecoming becomes a morass of suspicion with someone willing to kill her and the people she loves.
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About Author Anne Louise Bannon
Author Anne Louise Bannon’s husband says that his wife kills people for a living. Bannon does mostly write mysteries, including the Old Los Angeles Series, the Freddie and Kathy series, and the Operation Quickline series. She has worked as a freelance journalist for magazines and newspapers, including the Los Angeles Times. She and her husband, Michael Holland, created a wine education blog, and she co-wrote a book on poisons. She and her husband live in Southern California with an assortment of critters. Visit her website at AnneLouiseBannon.com.
A Necessary Death Historical Cozy Mystery Setting – A tavern in Colonial Pennsylvania (1764) Publisher : Wagonbridge Publishing Publication date : September 15, 2025 Print length : 272 pages Paperback ISBN-10 : 1953444202 ISBN-13 : 978-1953444202 Digital ISBN-13 : 978-1953444219 ASIN : B0FLDWVCJW
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With Penelope Corbitt in the kitchen, the tavern will never be the same.
Penelope Corbitt can turn a lump of meat and a bit of flour into a mouth-watering pie or make a tasty meal of cabbage and vinegar. But all her skill can’t save her family in the spring of 1763, when she loses everything to pay off her missing husband’s debts. Walking a tightrope between the freedom of poverty and the confines of propriety, she must accept her stingy brother-in-law’s reluctant charity to keep her family fed and her children close. The miserable journey north from Philadelphia is interrupted when the coach crashes in the mud. Penelope and her children are stranded at a run-down tavern. Penelope doesn’t think things can get worse.
Then she finds a dead man.
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About Author Terri Karsten
Living in the shadow of the Mississippi River bluffs, Terri Karsten has been a writer and educator for many years. She grew up in sunny San Jose, California, playing amid the cherry orchards that soon gave way to houses. In her search for education and adventure, she lived in Iowa and Wisconsin, Mexico and France, before settling into a hundred-year-old house in Winona, Minnesota. She spends most days in her tiny office, surrounded by books, papers, and good memories.
With more ideas than time, Terri writes a bit of everything, ranging from historical fiction novels to picture book folktales to dozens of short stories and articles in magazines, encyclopedias, and newspapers.
When she is not writing, Terri loves poring over old cookbooks and recreating dishes from long ago, especially medieval, Renaissance, and colonial foods. Always ready for the next adventure, she enjoys camping, hiking, and traveling. Her latest goal is to visit National Parks in every state. Only 13 states to go!
Murder, mines, and missing millions—retirement just got interesting.
When a shady real estate developer is found murdered beneath Harriet Keaton’s family home—shot, stabbed, and surrounded by rare 1830s gold coins—her estranged twin brother Joey is the prime suspect. He insists he’s innocent…but won’t name the real culprit. With Joey refusing to talk and millions missing from the retirement accounts, the future of the Independence Retirement Community is suddenly on the line. Now, whip-smart Harriet and her sleuthing partners—Craig Travail (savvy lawyer, reluctant romantic) and Yeager Alexander (conspiracy theorist, resident rabble-rouser)—must dig into the past to solve the crime. Their best lead? A decades-old memoir from Harriet’s treasure-obsessed father and whispers of a long-lost gold hoard. But treasure has a way of attracting trouble. As fortunes vanish and suspects multiply, the trio must untangle two decades of betrayal—before the killer strikes again. Murder, mayhem, and the Carolina gold rush: welcome back to the Indie, where retirement is anything but quiet.
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Praise for Deadly Gold Rush:
“Deadly Gold Rush is a satisfyingly complex entwining of events and personalities that proves hard to put down.” ~ Midwest Book Review “Deadly Gold Rush caught my attention from the first sentence and kept me transfixed to the very end. Couldn’t put it down.” ~ Readers’ Favorite Reviews “Lively mystery bubbling with unforgettable characters and historical spirit.” ~ Booklife Reviews “Mystery fans who love Richard Osman’s cozy Thursday Murder Club books will enjoy the similarly energetic take on mystery-loving retirees.” ~ Kirkus Reviews
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DEADLY GOLD RUSH Trailer:
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Book Details:
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Genre: Mystery, Legal Thriller, Historical
Published by: Lystra Books & Literary Services, LLC Publication Date: March 3, 2026 Number of Pages: 378 pages, Paperback ISBN: 979-8992136357, Paperback Series: The Indie Retirement Mystery Series, Book 2 | Each is a Standalone Mystery
The narrow alleyway walls muffled the gunshot as uptown Charlotte slept. It was one thirty in the morning on Tuesday, April 1. The phone call didn’t last long. “It’s me,” the caller said. “I need your help.” “I’m listening.” “I have a body.” “Whose?” “Chance Landry.” “Where are you?” “Lincoln Street. Inside the Rivafinoli Passage in South End. Next to the Queen Charlotte mural.” “Anyone with you?” The caller explained who else was still there. “You leave. Tell them to stay with the body and wait for my call. I need to think.” Three minutes later, the call was made to the only living person remaining in the passage who could help. “I am going to text you an address.” Next, they explained what to do with Landry’s body when they got to the address. “Are you kidding? He’s already dead.” But the person giving instructions had no sense of humor. “Just do it.” A text message followed with the address. The person who received the message knew how to follow directions and did as they were told.
Chapter Two
Vengeance is Sweet
The 11:15 p.m. email on Craig Travail’s phone read: Your friends are about to suffer financial ruin, untold heartbreak, and trials and tribulations. You have only yourself to blame. What? Travail read the email again, slower this time. He read it twice more. There was no author name. Just an unknown vengeanceissweet email address. Travail exhaled. His email checking practice was a bad habit, a routine held over from his career when clients expected their lawyers to be available 24/7. Nothing good ever came of his itch to scratch his email in-box for late-night messages, like now, when it would be twice as difficult to sleep after watching the late night local news—with its smorgasbord of crimes, collisions, and natural disasters—and reading this email. One news story was about elder fraud, a reminder of how susceptible retirees are to financial fraud schemes. Was that what was coming for his friends at the Independence Retirement Community, which everyone called the Indie? Were the residents about to suffer financial ruin because of risky investments? If so, he’d be angry at the perpetrators for their heartless guile and frustrated with his friends for being so gullible. The television show made the point, though, and he agreed, that adults spend most of their lives collecting assets to make retirement possible and the rest of their days worried if their accumulated treasure will last as long as they do, leading some retirees to make risky and uninformed choices with their nest eggs. Was that what his friends had done? Made bad choices with their money? Is that what the emailer taunted him about? Travail’s instinct was to fire off a harsh response to the email with some choice lawyer-like words and warnings, but he ignored the bait—he suspected they wouldn’t respond anyway—and he punched the remote control instead. The television screen faded to black, and his den fell silent, save for Blue’s rhythmic snores and his jerking legs. Travail’s black and tan coonhound must be dreaming, chasing ducks along the lake behind Travail’s cottage, as he was apt to do in real life, and as usual, failing to catch the waterfowl before they darted back into the water. Travail leaned over his club chair’s arm and let his free hand graze on Blue’s back until his pet stopped running in his sleep. Maybe the email was a prank. Maybe, like him, a friend had become bored with life at the Indie. And yet, the email bothered him. Whose lives—which friends’ lives—were about to be shattered? And how? And for that matter, why? And what did he have to do with it? Since moving a year earlier into the Independence Retirement Community, Travail had made two best friends, Harriet Keaton and Yeager Alexander, and several other good friends. He’d met many other retirees, some whose company he tolerated and some whose company he could do without. Either way, he didn’t want to see anyone hurt. He certainly didn’t want his close friends to suffer, and he didn’t want to be the person responsible for their pain. The flame on the candle he’d lit this morning was down to the base of the wick. He turned away from it, detesting the severe loneliness of March 31. There was no logic for feeling so alone—what with all the crimes, court cases, and historic mysteries Harriet, Yeager, and he navigated since he arrived at the Indie and the time they spent together—but it was hard to control his feelings, especially the feeling of being by himself. A Jewish resident told him about the tradition of lighting a candle on the anniversary of a loved one’s death. It felt loving to strike the match in Rachael’s honor, but as day became night, Travail’s mood shifted. It had been three years to the day. The flickering light had a strobe-like effect on the things that reminded him of Rachael: her furniture, her quilts, her artwork, her pictures. Travail missed Rachael’s kindness, her playfulness, her creativity, and the rituals they shared. The flicker made the past too present, making him long for another night and morning and day together. She was here, there, and everywhere, but nowhere at all. Assertive is what he’d needed to be in the moment that changed everything. He and Rachael were in the mountains at a high-elevation rental for a getaway when a freak storm rolled in and dumped six inches of snow on the ground. Rachael decided to drive to the local general store to stock the pantry for their cozy weekend together. He had a work call and offered to go with her after he finished. “It’s just snow,” she’d said. “Okay, but be careful,” he’d responded. “Always, dear.” Then she kissed him on the mouth, patted his bottom, and walked out of his life forever. The news came in a phone call from the local police. First came the shock, then the grief, and then the Monday-morning quarterbacking. He should have insisted Rachael let him drive her. He should have done more to protect her. If he had, maybe she would still be here. Maybe the out-of-control delivery truck that hit the black ice would have killed him instead of her, or maybe Travail could have prevented the accident. Spring in North Carolina was supposed to be about new beginnings, not endings, with the dogwoods and azaleas in bloom, but his eyes grew wet from the memories, and he felt a sudden heaviness in his body. He looked at the email again and became resolute. For sure, he would not make the same mistake twice with the people he cared about. He would protect them. But who was behind the email? Whoever wanted sweet vengeance against his friends wanted vengeance against him too, because their pain would be his pain. The question for his lawyer brain—used to solving riddles for years—was: who despised them and him that much? Like an unexpected electric shock, the answer startled him. This email was exactly the kind of plot his nemesis, Robert Elkin, would conjure. If Elkin hurt Harriet, Yeager, and his other close friends, he hurt Travail worse. But wasn’t Elkin no longer a threat? They’d exposed his concealment of the truth about the Mecklenburg Declaration of Independence, avoided death at the hands of his father, pushed him out of his Big Law leadership position, and seen to it that the state bar took his law license. Elkin no longer had big-time lawyer power. The only thing he had was anger, resentment, and a low-paying job as a paralegal with a former client, though Travail didn’t know the client’s name or their business. It was a sharp drop from the level of influence that had made the man dangerous, and yet, there was reason to be cautious. Elkin was cunning and would hold a grudge till death do they part. Travail leaned his head back in his chair, looked up at the ceiling, and pondered the text again: financial ruin, untold heartbreak, and trials and tribulations. Harriet was too smart to get caught up in a financial scam. Not so with Yeager. He was impulsive, likely to jump at the chance to possess something shiny because it might become shinier. Travail pulled an olive-colored sweatshirt over his t-shirt, woke Blue, and took him into the backyard to do his business under the stars. While he waited, Travail glanced across Lost Cove Lake to Harriet’s cottage. He inhaled the fresh night air, and he marveled at the main building’s reflection on the lake’s surface. Harriet’s lights were out. She, an early riser, must be asleep. Seeing Harriet’s peaceful cottage raised a question he’d been pondering. Should he ask her on a date? Carrie Roberts, the Indie Gossip Queen, thought so and often shared her opinion. Most days, it seemed like the right decision not to ask Harriet—or anyone else, for that matter—on a date. Three years wasn’t that long, really, since Rachael died. And yet, here he was, caught in a web he’d spun for himself, trapped somewhere between what he no longer had and the companionship he wanted but resisted. Harriet was his friend. Should he keep it that way? Harriet would most likely turn him down anyway. He was a project, and he knew it, starting with the lesson she’d had to teach him last year that retirement living is not life’s dead end but a fresh path forward. And now, with him being a sixty-six-year-old widower afraid to address his feelings, she’d be quick to beg off. Blue finished up, and the two headed inside. His watch told him it was a new day. He blew out the dwindling flame on the candle and headed to his bedroom, where Blue was already curled up on the end of Travail’s queen-size bed. Wearing only striped boxers and a white cotton t-shirt, Travail pulled the covers up to his chin. With a good night’s sleep, he’d be fresh in the morning to put his effort into stopping Elkin. He still had his law license, after all, and as Yeager would tell him from time to time, “You ain’t dead yet.” He closed his eyes and imagined tying a dry fly rig with two nymphs on a dropper line, the key to catching river trout on and below the surface at the same time. This falling-asleep system was better than counting backward from three hundred by threes. It worked its charm in less than five minutes. Travail didn’t know when he dozed off that the murder train had left the station. He didn’t know when he began to snore that someone had already set the trap for his friends. And he didn’t know when he fell into a deep sleep that when the sun came up, he would ponder, and not for the first time, how he could have been so wrong to believe retirement living would ever be boring or lonely. *** Excerpt from Deadly Gold Rush by Landis Wade. Copyright 2026 by Landis Wade. Reproduced with permission from Landis Wade. All rights reserved.
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About Author Landis Wade:
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Landis Wade is a recovering trial lawyer turned author who writes award-winning mysteries and legal thrillers with a historical bent. His publication credits include six works of fiction, eight non-fiction writing books, many short stories, and a podcast that produced 400 episodes of author interviews and writing discussions. His first novel in his Indie Retirement Mystery series, Deadly Declarations, won ten awards and Kirkus Reviews said of his second in the series, Deadly Gold Rush, that “Mystery fans who love Richard Osman’s cozy Thursday Murder Club books will enjoy the similarly energetic take on mystery-loving retirees.” Landis splits his time between Charlotte, Durham, and the North Carolina mountains. He is the recipient of the 2025 Founders Award for service to the Charlotte Writers Club and the literary community.
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Welcome to my stop on the virtual book tour for Moccasin Trace organized by Goddess Fish Promotions.
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Moccasin Trace
By Hawk MacKinney
Genre: Historical Fiction
Synopsis
…it was about the land.
It is July of 1859, a month of sweltering dog days and feverish emotional bombast. Life is good for widower Rundell Ingram and his hazel-eyed, roan-haired son, Hamilton. Between the two of them, they take care of Moccasin Hollow, their sprawling ancestral plantation home in the rolling farming country outside Queensborough Towne in east Georgia. Adjoining Ingram lands is Wisteria Bend, the vast slave-holding plantation of Andrew and Corinthia Greer, their daughter Sarah, and son Benjamin. Both families share generations of long-accepted traditions, and childhood playmates are no longer children. The rangy, even-tempered Norman-Scottish young Hamilton is smitten with Sarah, who has become an enticing capricious beauty—the young lovers more in love with each passing day, and only pleasant times ahead of them.
…but a blood tide of war is sweeping across the South, a tide that will forever change everyone and everything.
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Enjoy this exclusive peek inside:
A blizzard of thunder and hell-hot hate had smashed most homes in the countryside around Queensborough Towne. With Sherman and his army gone, worse than carpetbaggers and a lot more dangerous were the lawless bands of white trash infesting the countryside. No questions asked, easier to kill anyone that happened in their way, and get on with the stealin’. Human locust pillaging what they could get their hands on, torching homes, farms, what was left of the Queensborough courthouse. With parish land records in ashes a fair number of low-lifes claimed land which was never theirs.
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About Author Hawk MacKinney
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With postgraduate degrees and faculty positions in several medical universities, Hawk MacKinney has taught graduate courses in both the United States and Jerusalem. His professional writing includes articles on chordate neuroembryology, and aerospace research on muscle metabolic behavior in multi-orbital environments.
In addition, Hawk has authored several works of fiction including a historical romance Moccasin Trace which was nominated for both the prestigious Michael Shaara Award for Excellence in Civil War Fiction and the Writers Notes Book Award. His Cairns of Sainctuarie Science Fiction Series and his Moccasin Hollow Mystery Series have received national and international attention. He is currently working on a series of horror/suspense novels.
With a pitchfork through the man’s groin and another through his chest, it is clear that someone had murdered Chester H. Cranberry. It’s not something that could have happened accidentally. But that was 192 years ago. As Mildred Cranberry, the current family matriarch, puts it, “We have two women, two keys, two pitchforks, and one dead two-timing man.” Who in their right mind would want to dig up that cold case and try to solve it? It’s not like the murderer could be prosecuted in 2024, right? But what if a key piece of evidence can be dug up (literally)? And what if a descendant of Chester’s illegitimate child can get her hands on it? Mildred will need more than the Old Cranberry Ladies Garden Club members to solve this bizarre case. The spiritual support she needs may not be what she expects when the ghost of Elcira Cranberry, the widow murderess herself, arrives to do what? Tell the truth or protect her reputation?
The Ladies Garden Club of Old Cranberry, Connecticut, has a 200-year history that has remained shrouded in secrecy for so long, it has been lost to history, until now. Elcira Cranberry and freedwoman Deborah Townsend knew the men of the town would have no interest in a garden club, so it was the perfect cover for their secret organization. Now, nearly two centuries later, the current members have no idea what those ladies were up to in the early 1800s, right here in Connecticut. But the secret will soon be out.
Connecticut, 1833. A year after Chester Cranberry’s unsolved murder, the town that he founded continues to suspect that his wife, Elcira, ended his life. With insufficient evidence to bring her to trial, and little effort to find another suspect, the town gossip labels her “The Widow Murderess.” But Elcira has seven children to feed, ranging in age from three to nine, and her nanny, Deborah, a freed slave, is pregnant with her husband’s illegitimate child. All eyes are on these two women, expecting them to fail to keep the farm and the family together. When the general store cuts off Elcira’s credit and refuses to sell anything her farm produces, the alliance between Elcira and Deborah grows stronger, and the women set out to do something unthinkable, something that can cause one to be whipped and the other thrown in jail. They opened their home to runaway slaves seeking freedom along a secret route north. Behind the facade of a ladies’ garden club, the women run a clandestine school, teaching the formerly enslaved and runaways to read and write-a dangerous act that could destroy everything she’s built.
When a mysterious murder during a violent storm brings old secrets to light, the truth about Chester’s death threatens to surface. With the town’s suspicions mounting and powerful enemies closing in, Elcira must decide how much she’s willing to risk to protect those she loves and maintain the underground railroad that runs through her land.
A gripping historical novel about courage, family, and the price of freedom in pre-Civil War New England, The Widow Murderess explores how one woman’s determination to survive becomes a beacon of hope for those seeking liberty.
The last time the crows circled the old farmhouse, her husband Chester was found dead and the town named her a murderess. Thirty years later, the truth she buried with him is stirring again, the country is splitting in two, and the family she fought so hard to hold together is being pulled apart by a war that hasn’t yet been declared. Her grandson Auggie wants to fight for the Union. His mother, born to a Virginia plantation family, will do anything to drag him south instead. Millie — the rector’s daughter with golden hair and a satchel full of letters — waits at home for a boy who may never come back. And in the chapel behind the lilacs, Elcira and the women of her garden club continue the work no one is supposed to know about: sheltering freedom seekers as slave catchers tighten their grip on the Connecticut coast. Then a telegram arrives. And another. And the war everyone said would never come has come for the Cranberry’s all at once.
Perfect for readers of Kristin Hannah, Marie Benedict, Paulette Jiles, and Charles Frazier’s Cold Mountain — a story about what families inherit, what they hide, and what they’re willing to risk when the country they believed in begins to come apart.
Book Details:
Genre: Cozy Mystery, Historical Mystery
Published by: 4610 Publishing
Series: The Old Cranberry Ladies Garden Club
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About Author Bill Cusano:
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Bill Cusano is an author, a retired deacon in the Episcopal Church and a believer that it is the process rather than the outcomes that matter most in our lives. Retired from the corporate world and an eight-year stint running a non-profit feeding program, Bill attacks every project as a ministry, giving it his full commitment. Needing to readjust to life after losing the love of his life to leukemia in April of 2024, Bill returned to writing full-time, resulting in The Old Cranberry Ladies Garden Club series, the motivation and inspiration for which came from his wife’s voracious appetite for reading historical fiction. While this is Bill’s debut novel, he has always been a writer, publishing short stories and poems early on, and then beginning a daily spiritual blog in 2008. You can follow Bill’s Reflections From The Garden Bench along with other writings on his Substack account.
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When Crows Circle… It’s Time to Enter to Win
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