Homophobia, politics and perilous teenage rivalries make for an absorbing smalltown procedural, Havill's 12th novel in his Posadas County series. When Carmen Acosta, a middle-school tough girl, is severely beaten and stabbed in the ear with a hat pin, her brutalization may or may not have something to do with the disappearance of her neighbor Kevin Ziegler, the county manager, an honest and effective administrator who is keeping a few secrets from...

"When a county employee is found shot to death in sun-drenched daylight while sitting in his county road grader, Undersheriff Bill Gastner is faced with puzzling questions. The simplest explanation--that an errant bullet from a careless target shooter's rifle blew out Larry Zipoli's brains--is soon discarded as inconsistencies surface. The fatal bullet shows no rifling marks, and investigation reveals that the shooter walked directly toward the road...