My new novel,
Resurrection Garden, has just been released and is receiving 5 star reviews.
Resurrection Garden is a mystery novel set against the backdrop of the settling of the North Dakota prairie at the turn of the 20th century. Life on the North Dakota prairie in 1904 was still raw but modern times were coming with every new homesteader. Railroads and the telegraph were changing transportation and communication. The pace of life was speeding up. The land was filling up with settlers.
Jake Turner, a scarred veteran of the charge up San Juan Hill, has been a lone drifter through much of the settling of the west. Opportunity was growing out of the newly turned sod of the North Dakota prairie in 1904 when he stopped to take a part time job as a Deputy Sheriff, expecting to move on again when the dark parts of his past catch up to him.
An investigation into a murder of a man hated by everyone has threads that lead to his best friend, Isaac. Jake is ambushed and almost killed, but is nursed back to health by Isaac. While Jake follows the clues into a labyrinth of hatred, sordid crimes and missing money he becomes attached to an eight year old orphaned boy named Andy and falls in love with Isaac’s sister, Alice. After being alone for so long with no hope or care for what tomorrow might bring, Jake finds it difficult to accept these new emotional attachments.
Jake believes in Justice, but before he had only his own life on the line. When Andy is kidnapped and almost killed, Jake knows the killers will do anything to stop him. In order to protect Alice and Andy, he must break their hearts and leave them and North Dakota behind.
Jake knows he’ll be back. So do the killers. Trap and counter trap are laid. Jake knows there will be graves. He just doesn’t know who will be in them.
Resurrection Garden is not a western nor is it a Victorian mystery. The North Dakota prairie was almost the last frontier for homesteading. Immigrants were arriving daily looking for their chance at the American Dream. Land of their own to farm, to prosper and raise a family. It was hard, rough work in a harsh environment and many failed, even died, in the effort. Communities were new, yet people relied on one another and on the law.
In writing
Resurrection Garden, I wove into the story many snippets I culled from my research. Stories straight out the newspaper of the time became part of the backdrop to the mystery and to life as depicted in the novel. Since my own grandparents were settlers in North Dakota in the 1880’s, I also had personal history to draw on for background.
It is available from the publisher, MuseItUp Publishing at:
https://museituppublishing.com/bookstore2/
or at Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Sony, Omnilit and many other online booksellers.
Please give it a look. I hope you will enjoy it.
Frank Scully