First book in a laugh-out-loud small-town murder mystery series on the edge of the Navajo Nation

Rookie Navajo paralegal Naomi Manymules pauses on a lakeside clifftop to enjoy a moonlit moment. She hears someone swimming far below, and a boat drifts into view. When she hears what might be gunshots, she decides to head for home. The next thing she hears is news of a murdered local sleaze. His passing upsets exactly no one. But when his wife can offer only a coyote for an alibi, the police aren't inclined to look much further for a suspect. That leaves Naomi and her new boss, attorney Grant Carson, to take up sleuthing. They navigate through a colorful assortment of criminals, surly teenagers, prominent locals, some polygamists, and a mobster or two—and become targets themselves.

Meet the sleuths:

Naomi Manymules is bluffing her way into a new paralegal career for which she is not entirely qualified. Luckily, she’s smart and feisty and has lived in Sage Landing all her life, so she knows just about everything that goes on here on the western edge of the Navajo Nation. She’s also got some training and a lot of motivation; as a divorced, thirty-something mom of two, she needs a steady job and wants a stable career.

Grant Carson is middle-aged, cynical, and handsomely scruffy. He’s a reluctant attorney, a tough ex-prosecutor from Phoenix who has escaped to a remote lakeside town to practice just enough law to augment his small pension. Since arriving in Sage Landing, he's kept company with some attractive women, but the real passion of his life is his old yacht, the Deep Inn.

The small town is Sage Landing, one of the few inhabited spots on the shores of massive Lake Powell. It's a prosperous tourist destination with a lucrative power plant, a big marina, and a mix of diverse cultures.

Renee Dodd