Reckoning
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3.9 • 7 Ratings
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- $7.99
Publisher Description
Ty Dawson is a small-town sheriff with big-city problems, in this riveting crime thriller from the award-winning author of Fistful of Rain.
As lawman, rancher, and Korean War veteran, Ty Dawson has his share of problems in the southern Oregon county he calls home. Despite how rural it is, Meriwether can't keep modernity at bay. The 1970s have changed the United States—and Meriwether won't be spared.
A standoff looms when the US Fish & Wildlife Service seeks to separate longtime cattleman KC Sheridan from his water supply—ensuring the death of his livestock. If that's not enough trouble, a Portland detective is found dead in a fly-fishing resort cabin. Though the Portland police, including the victim's own partner, are eager to write off the tragedy as a suicide, Ty has his own thoughts on the matter—as well as evidence that points to murder. His suspicions soon mire him in a swamp of corruption that threatens nearly everyone around him. Turns out that greed and evil are contagious—and they take down men both great and small . . .
Praise for the Ty Dawson Mysteries
"Combines the mystery and honesty of Craig Johnson's Longmire with the first-person narration of a fiercely independent Oregon character." —Sheila Deeth, author of John's Joy
"A masterful work of a time gone by . . . Ty Dawson is a cowboy, lawman, father and philosopher like none other." —Neal Griffin, Los Angeles Times–bestselling author of The Burden of Proof
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Ty Dawson, sheriff of rural Oregon's Merriweather County in the early 1970s, faces off against big-city corruption in Birtcher's outstanding third entry in an increasingly gripping series (after 2018's Fistful of Rain). When federal fish and wildlife agents attempt to close off a portion of his neighbor's ranch and restrict the drinking water available to the rancher's cattle, Dawson plays peacemaker. Then the body of a Portland police detective with a history of corruption turns up in an abandoned resort cabin nearby, and Dawson gets pressure from Portland Police Bureau higher-ups to call it a suicide. As the sheriff starts making connections between the land dispute and the suspicious death, each case becomes more complicated, first by the arrival of the rancher's brother-in-law, an anti-government activist who turns the local land tussle into a national flash point, and then by self-styled militiamen who set up a confrontation that leaves the rancher and a deputy dead. Birtcher makes Oregon's stark urban-rural divide palpable, and his forceful prose recalls James Lee Burke. It all culminates in a memorable showdown whose violence feels well-earned. Readers will crave more from Dawson down the road.
