Accolades for Brad Smith’s celebrated crime novels include a nomination for the coveted Dashiell Hammett Prize. In Smith’s novel Red Means Run, prominent attorney Mickey Dupree is found dead at Burr Oak Golf and Country Club. On record as hating Mickey, small-time rancher Virgil Cain quickly becomes the prime suspect. Virgil knows the fix is in—so he sets out to find the real killer.

Brad Smith continues to make a name for himself as a darkly comic crime novelist. His second mystery starring Virgil Cain, Crow’s Landing finds the jack-of-all-trades out for a day of fishing on the Hudson River. But when he reels in a strange steel cylinder, a crooked cop quickly seizes it - along with his boat. Soon Virgil is teaming up with Dusty, a single mom who seems to know a little too much about the cylinder and its contents.