"Western Justice"

 Book titles are sometimes elusive. I sometimes spend days thinking about the book's plot, the characters, and the location, struggling to find an engaging name that reflects the plot. Other times, the title hits me like a bolt of lightning. "Western Justice" was a bolt of lightning. Allow me to digress...

My first trip to the Black Hills of Western South Dakota was when I was 12. Dad packed the family into our new Ford, and we drove to The Black Hills Roundup. That's the official title of the annual July 4th rodeo in Belle Fourche, South Dakota. Being a flatlander and a city kid, the experience was eye-opening. I'd never seen a bull rider or watched a cowboy trying to stay on a bucking bronco for eight seconds. To be honest, the closest I'd come to those experiences was being set on the back of a black angus calf by an uncle who thought it was hilarious to see his nephew bucked into the manure pile. I didn't last eight seconds, as is required to "place" in either the bull or bronc riding competitions.

Since that first trip, I've been back to the Black Hills more than 40 times. It shouldn't surprise my readers that one of my protagonists is a ranch girl from Spearfish, South Dakota. My fictional Park Service Investigators, Doug and Jill Fletcher return to a Back Hills US National Park Service sites to solve a mystery close to Jill's family in one book each year.

This past August, my wife and I loaded ourselves into our Ford pickup truck and headed west and spent a week scouting locations for future Fletcher books. Along the way, we visited the Vore Buffalo Jump, where we got a VIP tour from Jackie Wyatt, the president of the Vore Buffalo Jump Foundation. With her assistance, I located the perfect place to dump a dead body. Yes, that's really what I do on my "vacations". Don't worry, my wife is accustomed to my questioning of rangers and local folks about unsolved mysteries and stories behind local dead bodies. She generally wanders away while I ask questions about likely places to dump bodies, intriguing causes of death (thank you Crook County Coroner, Mike Frolander), and I grill park rangers, waitresses, and store clerks for juicy bits of local gossip that I weave into my plots. I get local color by watching people and listening to diner conversations.

As you may have guessed, "Western Justice" involves the discovery of a body in the pit of the Vore Buffalo Jump, near Aladdin, Wyoming. Other parts of the book are set in Aladdin, population 15, Devils Tower National Monument, and the Black Hills National Forest. One of my beta readers just texted to say she finished reading the book and was ready to pack her bags for a Black Hills trip. Yes, she was that intrigued by my description of the Vore Buffalo Jump. 

I sincerely hope I've done justice to the natural beauty, and unique "Western" feel of the region. Everyone I met on our trip was warm, friendly, willing to share thoughts and plots, and was pleased to meet someone who was trying to capture their region in a book.  In "Western Justice", the victim dies in a manner common to the punishment of wild west horse thieves and cattle rustlers. When I spoke about the plot of the then unnamed book to a Wyoming rancher, he nodded and said, "You're writing about Western justice in this one." There was the title!

"Western Justice" will be released January 13, 2024. If you check out my page on either the BWL site or on Amazon, you'll find the book synopsis and a link to pe-order an eBook. Consider it a Christmas gift to yourself.

Books We Love author page Hovey, Dean Doug Fletcher series - BWL Publishing Inc. (bookswelove.net)

On Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Western-Justice-Doug-Fletcher-Book-ebook/dp/B0CQ6GLV6D/