The City of Rocks (A BJ Vinson Mystery) by Don Travis | Cat's Review, Excerpt & #giveaway @DSPPublications

Confidential investigator B. J. Vinson thinks it’s a bad joke when Del Dahlman asks him to look into the theft of a duck… a duck named Quacky Quack the Second and insured for $250,000. It ceases to be funny when the young thief dies in a suspicious truck wreck. The search leads BJ and his lover, Paul Barton, to the sprawling Lazy M Ranch in the Bootheel country of southwestern New Mexico bordering the Mexican state of Chihuahua.

A deadly game unfolds when BJ and Paul are trapped in a weird rock formation known as the City of Rocks, an eerie array of frozen magma that is somehow at the center of the entire scheme. But does the theft of Quacky involve a quarter-million-dollar duck-racing bet between the ranch’s owner and a Miami real estate developer, or someone attempting to force the sale of the Lazy M because of its proximity to an unfenced portion of the Mexican border? BJ and Paul go from the City of Rocks to the neon lights of Miami and back again in pursuit of the answer… death and danger tracking their every step.

Buy links: DSP Publications | Amazon US | Amazon UK

Cat gives this one 5 Meows with a 0 Purr heat index...

The City Of Rocks is the Third book in the BJ Vinson Mystery Series but it stands alone just fine. 

BJ is an ex-cop that is now a private investigator. He gets a call to investigate a kidnapped duck for an insurance company because the duck was insured for $25,000. Yes, you read that right. A duck kidnapping. Quacky Quack the second. This adds a bit of humor to the seriousness of the mystery. We meet many colorful, intriguing characters. We meet Paul his lover of two years that becomes sort of a sidekick and adds a bit of lightness and romance to the story though there is no on page sex. The story is very well written with a great balance of BJ's work and daily life, settings, plots and the mystery. 

This is the first of this series I have read but plan to get the other two very soon. I love BJ Vinson and want more! If you like mystery and suspense, with no on-page sex, great characters, and beautiful settings you will love this. I highly recommend it!

Excerpt...

PROLOGUE

M Lazy M Ranch in the New Mexico Boot Heel

Wednesday, July 9, 2008

THE THIEF froze as a string of sharp yips hammered the quiet night. He’d darted both big Dobermans that were now sleeping soundly out at the fence, so this yapper must be a house pet. A light flashed briefly as the back door opened. A fur ball with pointed ears bounded down the steps and made straight for him. The feisty canine latched onto his pant leg and whipped it back and forth, growling furiously. A growl was preferable to a bark, so he dragged his dog-impeded leg like a zombie in some old Hollywood movie.

As he reached the poultry pen, all hell broke loose. A single quack built into a raucous caterwauling. Someone must have flipped a switch up at the house because brilliant light suddenly flooded the enclosure. He reeled backward, stunned by a sea of white. Ducks. Dozens of ducks. Hundreds. How was he going to find the right one?

The dog attached to his pant leg shifted its grip and closed on his ankle. Cursing, he gave an involuntary kick, sending the pooch over the fence. The ducks scattered, opening a circle of dark earth around the confused mutt. The pup transferred its attention to the birds and began a joyful chase, dashing this way and that, parting its panicked prey in dizzying waves of undulating white, creating a living kaleidoscope of shifting shades and shapes.

Then he saw her. In a coop all by herself. Like she waited to turn into a swan or something. A clamor from the house galvanized him into action. He vaulted the fence, threw open the cage door, and dragged her out by the neck. He ignored the claws raking flesh from his forearms as he fled through a horse corral at the back of the pen. He made it to the cover of some shrubbery before the ranch came alive. Moments later a woman’s agonized wail rose above everything.

Remembering he needed to deliver the duck alive, he loosened his hold on the feathery neck. The bird immediately set up a loud protest that could have awakened the dead but wasn’t enough to overcome the clamor of the hundred or so other birds. He turned and headed for his pickup. Best get out of there before Millicent Muldren’s drovers filled him full of lead.

Read chapter 1 as well, HERE

Don Travis is a man totally captivated by his adopted state of New Mexico. Each of his mystery novels features some region of the state as prominently as it does his protagonist, a gay ex-Marine, ex-cop turned confidential investigator. Don never made it to the Marines (three years in the Army was all he managed) and certainly didn’t join the Albuquerque Police Department. He thought he was a paint artist for a while, but ditched that for writing a few years back. A loner, he fulfills his social needs by attending SouthwestWriters meetings and teaching a weekly writing class at an Albuquerque community center.

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