Lethal Purpose

from Hilliard & Harris

  The 6th Lou Corso Mystery

    Lou Corso, the tough ex-LAPD detective and owner of the busy Peck Security firm, is wrestling with the issue of turnover at work, a host of new employees, and the need for new quarters. The whole office is stressed. So imagine how Lou feels late one evening when the plaintive cries of an animal in distress take him outside his home to find a
kitten nailed to his front door. Lou is too late to save the creature, but as he is absorbing the threatening implications of the act, he receives a phone call. The voice is low and crazy, the threat absolute.  Lou's work with battered women has made him a target of angry husbands in the past, but only a few seem psychotic enough to pull such a sick stunt. As Lou's family and friends become victims of further violent attacks, Lou must figure out the real motive. Is it an abusive husband taking revenge or are the attacks connected to one of the cases his firm is handling?  Lou knows that his life and the lives of his loved ones ones depend on finding the truth and fast!

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 Bitter Creek
 Reissued 11-6-2006
 from

   
from Hilliard & Harris

                 
                      

    Jim Sutter, a diminutive, sad-eyed drifter with a hidden past, rides into the South Dakota cowtown of Bitter Creek in a time of savage drouth. Set upon and beaten by toughs, he is rescued by widowed rancher, Jenny Olds, who he soon comes to love. Jim decides to stay on with Jenny and soon finds himself in the middle of a blood feud between the powerful cattlemen's association and the sodbusters, led by fiery Lucas Brand.
     Hugh Tallant spearheads the fight for the ranchers, seeking to crush the sodbusters that control the vital Bitter Creek River. Tallant is aided by the notorious gunfighter Gil Fetterman and Milo Pitt, a sadistic bruiser. And before long, Sutter is torn between his desire to protect Jenny and the sodbusters and his own solemn oath to give up the gun.
     Into this brew rides a cast of lively characters, including courageous Nell Vermillion, a local shopkeeper, George Armstead, a man uncertain of his own mettle, Red West, Jenny's dying foreman, Dottie Lister, a soiled dove, Randy Pinto, a boy who has to grow up in a hurry, and gunfighter Jack Counts who makes a bargain with the devil.

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     Set in the American Dakota territory during the 1886 drought, Carter Swart's Bitter Creek is a compelling novel of escalating tension and blood feud between stockmen and homesteaders, as cattle die and control of the river becomes central to a brutal dispute involving at first fists, then guns. Only one man has the skill in negotiation to prevent all-out war, but he himself has given up the gun! A dramatic and exciting epic of the Old West, Bitter Creek is deftly narrated by Alan Zimmerman and highly recommended, thoroughly entertainting listening. 4 cassettes, 360 minutes.

5 Star Review:  Midwest Book Review Americana Books (Audio books)

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In this fourth Lou Corso adventure, Lou is reunited with his estranged daughter, Cordelia, a surprisingly delightful and clever young woman. He also must suffer April Fool's day jokes at the office while bucking heads with a persistently suspicious homicide officer. Detective Twigg is investigating the murder of a wife beater and has Lou ranked number one on his suspect list. Lou is later slowly drawn into the kidnapping of a young woman which ultimately leads him into a violent dance with death.

Nightingale

A Western Novel

Jim Nightingale is a tough lawman--town marshal in Blanchard, Colorado--who has suffered a tragedy at the hands of two killers he once jailed then released. When Nightingale sets off to pursue the murderers he is out for revenge, but soon his perilous quest becomes a journey to a new life. Nightingale is the latest western from Carter Swart.

Review:

Lou Corso's first big adventure finds Lou stalked by a determined sociopath with a big grudge. Worse, Lou's beloved partner at Peck Security and Investigations is run down and killed by a hit and run driver. And just when Lou thinks he's untangled the web of deceit surrounding her death, he's sent lurching down another path entirely to find her cold-blooded killer. Sexy women and psycopaths are served up quickly and with twists enough for everybody .

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In this third Lou Corso mystery, Lou learns the meaning of betrayal. Also, he and his pal Abe Brown find themselves in extreme danger from a clever hit man who is busy cleaning up loose ends, the loose ends being Abe and Lou. Moreover, Lou is approached by an old enemy who wishes to make amends--he says. It's up to Lou to sort this all out and to survive in a world suddenly darkened by peril.

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   The 2nd Lou Corso Mystery