The Devil in Maryvale by Jackie Griffey (
SYKM) is the 1st in her Maryvale series of apparently-cozy mysteries (according to the author's bio-blurb and the subtitles and categories, even though the sleuth is non-amateur), starring a Tennessee county sheriff, this one an installment where he investigates an apparent outbreak of devil worship amongst high schoolers
, free courtesy of publisher ePublishing Works! (exclamation mark theirs), who are e-printing it from its 2005 Bookman Publishing edition.
NB: in case you were wondering, the other books in the series seem to centre around more "ordinary" murders just involving old scandals and trying to blow up cookbook authors and such.
Currently free @
B&N (may also drop in the
UK later),
Kobo &
iTunes &
Google Play (all available to Canadians), and will likely get matched in selected countries at
Amazon eventually (linked for your price-drop-check convenience.
And this has been the (late!) selected 3rd non-repeat free ebook thread of the day.
A little bit by default, but it's nice to see a few more mystery offerings and more stuff out from ePublishing Works! this month (couponable @ Kobo, BTW, in case you end up enjoying any of their 1st-in-series freebie offerings and would like to follow-up).
Also because
"Syzygy" and
"Die Hand Die Verletzt" are still two of my personal favourite* episodes of The X-Files dealing with comedic and serious(-ish) takes on the entire high school secret devil worship sacrifice cult suspicion trope. Solving the mystery of the horny beast, indeed!
Enjoy!
Description
When a local girl's body is found brutally stabbed in Maryvale's woods, Sheriff Cas Larkin suspects members of a high-school "club" that smacks of devil worship.
Then livestock goes missing, the county judge begins standing in Cas's way at every turn, and local students report being coerced into dark ceremonies.
Now Cas must pick up the pace and dig deep before Maryvale gets any stranger... or there may be the devil to pay.
* I'll say it here so you don't have to: "Sure. Fine. Whatever."