Book picks similar to
The Devil's Music (Company Files, #3) by Gabriel Valjan
award-winner-best-reviewed
best-historical-novel
fiction
historical-mystery
A Coal Miner's Quilt
Deanna Edens - 2020
This account is told by an elderly woman, named Sadie, who lives in Sissonville, West Virginia, and her neighbor, Finn, who is an authority on the myths and legends of the Hatfields and McCoys. Throughout this narrative, they recall stories that have been passed down from generation to generation pertaining to family feuds and the coal mining wars that took place in West Virginia during the turn of the last century. The tales they tell encompass brutal incidents, such as the Matewan Massacre, the Battle of Blair Mountain and some background surrounding the famous Hatfield and McCoy feud. It is also a portrait of a family who lived through the times when coal miners were subjected to harsh and unfair treatment while working for nonunion companies, and the battle that brought the United Mine Workers of America into the coal fields of Southern West Virginia. Many of the characters, such as Sid Hatfield, Jessie Lee Maynard, “Mother” Mary Harris Jones and the Baldwin-Felts detectives may be familiar to the reader, but even if they aren’t, you will still find yourself enthralled with the history of West Virginia and their people, while discovering one reason that “Mountaineers are Always Free.”
Vigilante Reloaded: Hard Boiled: 1
Jack Quaid - 2019
Those things and a little bit of luck have kept him alive, but Angus’ luck is about to be put to the ultimate test. When every clue in a robbery gone wrong points to a unit of corrupt cops, Angus is forced to confront the cop culture he’s been a part of his entire career. Hunted, alone and with no place left to turn, Angus embarks on a pedal to the metal, action packed hell ride down into the gutters where right and wrong quickly become twisted and problems are solved with gunfire and bloodshed. Angus will put his own morality on the line, but will he become the very monster he set out to destroy? This explosive thriller is perfect for fans of heroes who shoot first and ask questions later. Start reading to experience Angus Sullivan’s pulse pounding rampage now!
The Codebreaker Girls
Ellie Curzon - 2021
Rosie Sinclair is full of pride to be doing her bit for the war effort as a driver at Cottisbourne Park - the secret heart of Britain's fight against Germany, where a team of brilliant and eccentric codebreakers are battling to save the country.But when she's given a new mission to drive Major-General 'Bluff' Kingsley-Flynn down to Cottisbourne, Rosie finds herself on the frontline of a new battle - to uncover a possible spy at the Park who is jeopardising their vital work, and to resist her own growing attraction to the dashing Bluff himself...As the threat to her fellow codebreaker girls grows ever stronger, Rosie realises her country needs her more than ever. Can she save the day without losing her heart?
The Abandoned Girl
Diane Winger - 2017
Rejected by her father and his new family, she is shipped off to be raised by relatives she knows solely by reputation, and the reality is even worse than the stories she’s heard. Her hopes for her future fade as they strip away her independence and strive to tame her wild spirit.Pregnant at sixteen, Katharine also knows what it’s like to be left behind. Lonely and lost, she seeks a path back to the simple dreams she once held dear.When their paths intersect, the repercussions shape both of their worlds in ways neither could imagine.
The Orphan’s Christmas
Molly Britton - 2019
Soon after, Abby and her mother find themselves out on the streets in the bitter cold. But the heartache has only begun, and each Christmas brings cruel twists of fate that change Abby's life forever. The factory job Abby thought would save her sends her running for her life. When she can run no more and collapses on the street, she is taken in by Lucas, a man she wants to trust but can't. She accepts the job he offers, buying time until she can escape. But freedom costs Abby many things, and her heart cannot stop thinking of Lucas. As Abby accepts her hopeless plight in life, Christmas approaches, a time of deep sadness for Abby. But an unexpected meeting brings hope to Abby, if only briefly. Can Abby find happiness amidst all the sorrow in her life? What has become of Lucas, the only man who showed kindness to her?
SEEKING SINAI
Barry Pollack - 2012
This historical tale has been unread for three millennia and so shakes the rabbi's faith that he kills to keep the object and the tale it tells to himself. So begins a quest to find the real Mount Sinai and a treasure buried within the Mountain of God. The treasure hunt engages the skills of a charming, beautiful but conniving Los Angeles realtor; her lover, an LAPD detective; a young and adventurous Silicon Valley billionaire; and a Harvard Egyptologist. SEEKING SINAI tests the limits of more than one man’s faith and becomes entangled in Middle East turmoil and political intrigue. Uncovering Sinai’s treasures also a presents a conundrum. Finding them would be the greatest archeological discovery of all time; revealing them to the world could jeopardize the moral foundation of the world’s greatest religions. Author Barry Pollack weaves an adventure story that takes you from ancient Egypt to California to the modern Middle East and back again. It’s a journey that weaves Jewish philosophy with the politics of oil and water and the meaning and value of faith.
Australia
Stewart Giles - 2021
It's February in York and the dark, dreary days are getting him down. When his wife, DC Erica Whitton wins a holiday to Australia, Smith is reluctant to go. He has no desire to go back home. Against his better judgement, Smith agrees to show his wife and daughter where he grew up. The perfect holiday soon turns into a nightmare as Smith finds himself in a race against time to save the only people he's ever cared about. Children in Smith's home town are being murdered. There's something rotten there, an evil Smith has never come across before, and the local police are not what they appear to be. When his wife is attacked and his daughter is taken, Smith realises he's on his own. With the clock ticking, and not knowing if his daughter is alive or dead, Smith comes face to face with the worst kind of evil he's ever encountered.
The Ordeal of Andy Dean
Douglas Hirt - 1993
Now Franklin Dean is searching for his daughter with a U.S. Marshal. Dean and the lawman know that Andy has been picked up by the notorious Neville Hallidae gang. But what the manhunters don't know is how the presence of little Andy Dean is changing each one of the hard-bitten bank-robbers, and setting off a struggle among them. Now, as the law closes in on two sides, Andy is caught in between. Each outlaw knows Andy can identify them and that their final choice must be between her life...or theirs.
Showdown At Apache Butte
R. Cameron Cooke - 2018
Cameron Cooke... Mountain man and army scout Jacob Utah is called to guide a cavalry patrol across the harsh, relentless Arizona Territory. The purpose of the mission is a secret, known only to the soldiers. That suits Utah just fine, until the seemingly simple job takes a deadly turn. A mysterious sharpshooter begins shadowing the patrol, killing the soldiers one-by-one. Utah soon discovers the men he rides with are not what they seem, that they have a dark history which is coming back to haunt them. With fierce Apaches on the warpath and a sadistic gunman doggedly pursuing them at every turn, Utah must lead his dubious companions through scorching desert sands, treacherous canyons, and narrow mountain passes to reach an abandoned outpost at a place called Apache Butte, where old scores will be settled, and blood will be spilt...
Elliot "Bear Scat" Sutta, Mountain Man
Terry Grosz - 2017
Killing the biggest deer in his life, Elliott’s joy is short-lived when he is swooped down upon by a tornado, which ‘whirls away’ his deer and leaves him battered and bruised without family or farm, all destroyed by the airborne killer! Elliott finds himself alone and soon hunted by old friends who realize that he has discovered a hoard of Spanish silver dollars hidden in his father’s “Posthole Bank”! Thus begins Elliott’s adventures as a man and fur trapper in the wilderness, attempting to find his fur trapper brother Jacob. As a ‘greenhorn’, he finds himself betrayed by trappers posing as friends who soon abandon him on the prairie! There he faces starvation and then a chance meeting with a mentor occurs. In the years that followed, “Bear Scat” faces capture by the deadly Sioux, becomes a Mountain Man in the territory of the deadly Blackfeet, faces grizzly bear attacks, ‘moose madness’, deadly Indian battles, experiences heartaches in opportunities lost trying to find his elusive brother, is engaged in a deadly fight with white trappers resulting in a sad loss, all ending in an unexpected surprise! Elliott “Bear Scat” Sutta, Mountain Man is an epic story of the life and times of a Mountain Man who rises from the ashes and tries to find his brother in an unexplored West that was young, dangerous and yet beautiful beyond compare, told only as a man can tell it who “was there”…
Apocalypse Trails: Episode 3
Joe Nobody - 2016
As he passes through the doomsday landscape created from Yellowstone’s epic eruption, Jack’s life is threatened by an avalanche of volcanic sludge, resulting in the loss of his transportation and equipment. Finding himself injured and marooned in a deeply divided community, the commander’s only hope for survival is a desperate gamble through hostile territory and the dim hope that a remote military base still exists and can provide life-sustaining resources for the fledgling group of survivors.
Beneath A Colesberg Sky
Jeffrey Whittam - 2015
From Dakota’s Black Hills to the gold and diamond fields of Southern Africa, Jim O’Rourke and his daughter, Kathleen step from the sailing ship Eudora and take their covered wagon deep inside a vast and ancient wilderness. The land is raw-boned and unforgiving – the men and women who search its heart for wealth, love and adventure, even more so. Smoke from a thousand fires clung to a broken landscape and towering above it, churned from a vast and open wound in the earth’s crust, were those billowing clouds of powdered Kimberlite; as yellow, ochrous fingers they reached upwards for over a thousand feet, deep inside the heart of that darksome Colesberg sky.
The Gunfighter: A Novel
Steven Hardesty - 2017
A classic Wild West novel, tough and true.
"The key to being a live gunfighter instead of a dead one is not to gun fight," said Wyatt Earp."How the hell do I do that?" Ronas said."Get up close and pistol-whip the son of a bitch. Buffalo him to his knees. Shove the barrel in his mouth and make him weep for mercy. Then arrest and shackle him. He won't want to trouble you again."