Review: Midnight Crossing: A Mystery by Tricia Fields

It is night as the fifth book in the series, Midnight Crossing, begins and Police Chief Josie Gray is at her isolated home on Schenck road outside of Artemis, Texas. Nobody should ever be on that road unless they are visiting her or her neighbor Dell who has his own place just behind hers. Nobody should be out there at two in the morning on this October night. Yet there is a car with its lights off moving by the outside of the house.

When it happens again the next night at about the same time, she knows something is going on in the desolated land surrounding her home. This time she has backup as Nick Santos has spent the night. A kidnapping negotiator, he knows guns, the cartels, and more and shares Gray’s concerns about the vehicle moving by her home. They go outside to see why the vehicle is once again slowly moving by her house without its lights.

After it leaves into the darkness, they hear something on her porch. They soon find a clearly terrified woman hiding on Gray’s porch. Most likely, she came across the nearby border in this Big Bend region of deep southwest Texas. What happened to her and why is a story that she is nowhere ready to tell. The dead woman in the nearby field can’t tell Artemis Police Chief Josie Cray anything either.

Those two women are just one of several mysteries at work in Midnight Crossing by Tricia Fields. This excellent series began with The Territory and continues here with another excellent installment. Filled with numerous detailed characters, a complex mystery, and an obvious appreciation for the desert beauty of far southwest Texas, Midnight Crossing is another very good read in a very good series that evolves book to book 

Midnight Crossing: A Mystery

Tricia Fields

http://www.triciafields.com

A Thomas Dunne Book (Minotaur Books)

http://www.minotaurbooks.com

2016

ISBN# 978-1-250-07628-1

Hardback (eBook available)

310 Pages

$26.99

Material supplied by the good folks of the Plano Public Library System.

Kevin R. Tipple ©2016

Review: "Firebreak" by Tricia Fields

Weather in Texas often is one of two extremes--- flood or fire. It has been a couple years since the floods came to Southwest Texas. Now it has been 9 months since rain fell in the desert area and now wildfire is the threat to Artemis and the surrounding area. The threat comes from the north and south with Artemis trapped in the middle. Evacuations are ordered for parts of Arroyo County, but not everyone will agree to leave. This area of southwest Texas where folks are used to hard times, desert conditions, and relying on themselves and their ingenuity to survive, makes for a people to don’t turn away from a fight.

In the aftermath of the fires that spare the home of Artemis Police Chief Josie Gray, a body is found in the remains of the badly damaged home of Billy and Brenda Nix. If his wife and manager, Brenda, is to be believed Billy is about to make it big with a Nashville music contract. Billy is old school country and sings while playing guitar. Both he and his wife evacuated, according to some of the locals, but neither one is answering their cell phone. They may be up in Austin lining up future events or somewhere else. In the chaos of the evacuation they were seen at least once, but nobody really knows where they are or why they would not be answering their cell phones.

The location of the Nixes, the identity of the body, and figuring out what happened should be Police Chief Josie Gray’s priority and focus. A focus that isn’t easy to maintain, as thanks to the events in Wrecked, her longtime boyfriend has packed up and left. Getting kidnapped by a drug cartel can kind of put a damper on the whole romance thing. Four months later and normalcy is a foreign concept for both her and Dillion.

Firebreak is the fourth in a series that began with the award winning The Territory. This latest mystery features once again the deep characters and desert beauty present in the earlier books as well as the complicated cases Police Chief Josie Gray and her team must solve. This is a series best read in order as there are references to earlier events in each novel. The books are very good and so is Firebreak. If this series is new to you, it will be another year before Tricia Fields has another so get to work as you have some very good books to read. 

Firebreak

Tricia Fields

http://www.triciafields.com

Minotaur Books (A Thomas Dunne Book)

http://www.minotaurbooks.com

March 2015

ISBN# 978-1-250-05505-7

Hardback (available in e-book)

288 Pages

$25.99

Material supplied by the good folks of the Plano Public Library System.

Kevin R. Tipple ©2015