Saturday, January 21, 2017

Land, Love and Betrayal

A late night call on the Sheriff's phone line. A woman sobbing on the other end, "He's dead, he's dead." Kate Fox struggles to get the information from the hysterical woman.

Rancher Eldon Edwards is dead from a gunshot wound. Also shot and bleeding is Sheriff Ted Connor, Kate's husband. The sobbing woman is Ted's mistress Roxy.

In Stripped Bare by Shannon Baker the plot dips and dives from one suspect to another and Kate veers with each revelation. Life in Nebraska is all about land and when someone threatens landowners, violence rears its head.

Kate discovers Eldon was planning to sell his 100,000 acre ranch to a rich outside. Some of his neighbors feel threatened by the sale to outsiders, but others want to cash in. To complicate the search for the killer, Eldon's granddaughter and heir is missing.

When Ted confesses to shooting Eldon, Kate knows it is to protect Roxy, but what is the point? If Ted shot Eldon, who shot Ted? After Kate is a victim of several "accidents", she knows she is getting close to the killer.

Stripped Bare is an intense journey through the pitfalls of loving your land and the feelings it stirs among those with and without it. This appears to be the first in the Kate Cox series.

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