In this unusual spin on the classic spy novel, murder strikes from our wartime pasts...Iraq War veteran Sam Blackman with his prosthetic leg and his no-nonsense private eye partner Nakayla Robertson love their investigations which always carry a thread from the past—and they love each other. An interracial couple in the new South, the Asheville, NC, pair has surrounded themselves with a terrific support team including an unorthodox lawyer and a veteran cop. They deploy humor both to bind them together and to deflect insults. Plus, it helps deal with the tragedies their work uncovers.Such a tragedy interrupts a meeting between the PIs and the neighboring law office when a body is unearthed from the grounds of the nearby Pisgah Astronomical Research Institute. During the Cold War it monitored developing space programs. Today it plays a vital role gathering weather and climate data. The body has been in the ground a long time. Why would its discovery...

A river gives up its dead, but not its secrets...Sam Blackman and Nakayla Robertson, partners in a private investigation agency in Asheville, North Carolina, are hired by the widow of an environmentalist who died while monitoring water quality in the nearby Pigeon River. No soil or water samples were found near the deceased, and his widow doesn't believe his death was an accident.Sam had, in fact, witnessed a public altercation between the man and local mill heir Luke Kirkpatrick just two days prior. Both Luke and his father, Ted, are prime suspects because of the threat that contamination poses to their proposed business expansion. Meanwhile, preparations for a local festival suffer some violent setbacks. Are the events related? And can Sam and Nakayla identify the killer and serve justice before Asheville is threatened once again?

When private detective Sam Blackman agrees to help his partner and lover, Nakayla Robertson, conduct a fundraiser for orphaned twin boys, he does so to ease his conscience. The boys' parents were killed in a courtroom shootout where Sam was the key witness against the twins' father.The charity event, a nighttime ghost tour of the legendary haunted sites of Asheville, North Carolina, seems harmless enough. Sam only has to tell the story of a grief-stricken woman who hanged herself from an old, arched stone bridge. "Helen, come forth," he cries. Sam and his tour-goers expect the actress playing Helen's ghost to walk toward them from the bridge's dark recesses. Instead, her body tumbles from overhead and dangles at the end of a noose. Someone has reenacted the legend with deadly authenticity.When a second murder mimics another old ghost tale, the police fear a macabre serial killer is on the prowl. But the case isn't Sam's to solve. Then, a tidal wave of evidence begins to point...

When Cherokee burial remains are unearthed on the site expanding a local cemetery, the dual occupations of Barry Clayton, part-time deputy and full-time undertaker, collide. Then, during the interment of the wife of one of Gainesboro, North Carolina's most prominent citizens, Cherokee activist Jimmy Panther leads a protest. Words and ¬ fists fly. When Panther turns up executed on the grave of the deceased woman, Barry is forced to confront her family as the chief suspects. But the case lurches in a new direction with the arrival of Sheriff Tommy Lee Wadkin's Army pal, Boston cop Kevin Malone. He's on the trail of a Boston hit man who arrived at the Cherokee reservation only days before the murder. Malone is convinced his quarry is the triggerman. But who paid him? And why? The accelerating investigation draws Barry onto the reservation where Panther's efforts to preserve Cherokee traditions threatened the development of a new casino, a casino bringing millions of dollars of...

The Blackman & Robertson Detective Agency faces a disturbing reality: no clients. So when Nakayla Robertson suggests a mushroom hunt at the historic, freed-slave commune The Kingdom of the Happy Land, Sam Blackman reluctantly agrees. Hunting the elusive edible, he stumbles into a rotting log...with a skeleton hidden inside. As intrigued as Sam is, this isn;t his case. So the local authorities tell him to butt out. Then Marsha Montgomery comes to Asheville asking Sam and Nakayla to investigate a 45-year-old burglary at her mother;s home. Someone stole a rifle and a photograph of Marsha;s mother, grandmother, and great grandmother taken in 1932 by renowned photographer Doris Ulmann. The site of the photograph is The Kingdom of the Happy Land. Marsha;s visit is no coincidence. Sam;s being played. But why?When Marsha;s 85-year-old mother Lucille is arrested for murder, Sam knows there is something amiss. Is the skeleton that of Jimmy Lang, Lucille;s lover and Martha;s father, a...

Towns like Gainesboro, North Carolina, may be small but go big on local traditions. When funeral director and part-time deputy sheriff Barry Clayton and his childhood nemesis, Archie Donovan, Jr., unite to create a fundraising float in Gainesboro's annual Apple Festival Parade, what could go wrong? With Archie involved - anything!First, the Grand Marshal, NC Secretary of Agriculture Graham James, is attacked by a gunman and Barry's Uncle Wayne is critically wounded in the melee. The assailant is killed. Then, when the body of a convenience store owner is discovered less than an hour later with the gunman's food stamp card in his wallet, the case escalates. Two men dead. What is the connection?Barry and Sheriff Tommy Lee Wadkins swiftly learn their small town offers no protection against big-time crime. The body count rises as the scope of their homicide investigation crosses into the realm of the U.S. Marshals and their secretive Witness Protection Program. To penetrate...

From Publishers WeeklyStarred Review. At the start of this outstanding first in a new series from de Castrique (Final Undertaking), Sam Blackman, a feisty army vet who lost part of a leg in the current Iraq War, is in his last days of rehab at a V.A. hospital in Asheville, N.C., when he meets Tikima Robertson, a black woman and fellow amputee who invites him to apply for a job at her security firm. Soon after, Sam phones the firm and learns Tikima is dead. Sam speaks at Tikima's funeral, during which her apartment is ransacked. Tikima's sister, Nakayla, later finds that the intruders overlooked a diary from 1919 bookmarked with Sam's name and number. The diary vividly brings to life the intrepid journey of a white funeral director and the Robertson sisters' great-great-grandfather, Elijah Robertson, that ends in Elijah's murder. Suspecting a connection between the long-ago murder and Tikima's untimely drowning, Sam decides to investigate, but he must overcome hurdles of body and mind as he pursues the truth. A wealth of historical detail, an exciting treasure hunt and credible characters distinguish this fresh, adventurous read. (June) Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. From BooklistWhile recuperating in an Asheville, North Carolina, veterans’ hospital after losing a leg in Iraq, Sam Blackman  meets fellow vet Tikima Robertson, who stops by his hospital room with a possible job offer and a promise to visit again. When Tikima doesn’t return, Sam tries to contact her and finds she has been murdered. After Tikima’s sister, Nakayla, shows Sam a journal that Tikima wanted him to see, he becomes involved not only in finding Tikima’s murderer but also in solving the mystery of the 90-year-old journal itself, which refers to another murder, of the Robertsons’ great-great grandfather. Gold, emeralds, the Vanderbilt’s Biltmore estate,  and author Thomas Wolfe play roles in the generations-old case, which Sam and Nakayla unravel in a suspenseful, compelling narrative. A nice mix of past and present and a sympathetic sleuthing duo will keep readers engaged. De Castrique is the author of the Barry Clayton Undertaking series,  also set in North Carolina. --Sue O'Brien

The Singularity-the looming point of no return when Artificial Intelligence surpasses human cognitive abilities, with consequences no one can foresee, and only a handful of people understand.Rusty Mullins, ex-Secret Service, has never heard of the Singularity. He only knows that after the deadly challenges of his last job for security firm Prime Protection, he swore he'd stop risking his life on assignments...