HIGH ON A CLIFF THE SHOOTER PANNED HIS NIGHT SCOPE BACK AND FORTH ACROSS THE SAN PEDRO VALLEY

Sheriff Joanna Brady is the law in Cochise County, and she will never allow her personal trials to interfere with the job she was elected to do–especially now that death has invaded Bisbee, Arizona, and has shattered the small desert town’s fragile peace. A gun dealer has died violently, and his stock of high-powered weapons has been cleaned out. Suspicion falls upon rancher Alton Hosfield, an armed separatist at war with the federal government and the local law–with everyone, in fact, whom he perceives as a threat to his independent way of life.

Joanna Brady suspects the solution is not so cut-and-dried especially when the cold-blooded slaying is followed by a series of others, equally horrific and perplexing. At best, an incendiary “Ruby Ridge” situation is brewing. At worst, a maniacal serial killer has come to feed on the unsuspecting community. But Joanna’s preoccupation with bringing a murderer to justice could take a terrible toll on her private life . . .and unravel threads of family, love, and responsibility that might never again be retied.

When it comes time to write a book, I usually start with the title. Then, once I find out who’s dead, I spend the rest of the book trying to find out who killed that person and why. Over the years I’ve learned to have a possible title in mind when my editor calls needing it.

For the Joanna Brady books, I try to use something that has to do with Cochise County–a geographical location or a plant. In this case, when my editor called I had settled on Cascabel Crossing, named for a tiny hamlet called Cascabel along the San Pedro River.

“I don’t like it,” my editor said.

“But you do know what Cascabel means, don’t you?”

“No. What?”

“Rattlesnake,” I replied.

“Well,” she said. I like Rattlesnake Crossing.”

“But there’s no place in Cochise County named Rattlesnake Crossing.”

“You do write fiction,” she reminded me.

And so the book became Rattlesnake Crossing. Not only did I invent the place that gives the book its name, I also invented the Apache legend that goes along with it. I call that writing fiction twice removed.

JAJ