Amazon.com Review
This latest in the increasingly popular Ella Clah series (Death Walker, Bad Medicine, Enemy Way) packs enough action into one slim novel to satisfy readers used to the more cerebral novels of Tony Hillerman and others writing crime fiction featuring Native American heroes. Like them, the Thurlos put a lot of Indian lore into their books and focus on characters who struggle to live in two cultures but are never fully embraced by either. Ella Clah is a thoroughly modern career woman, but her loyalty to her heritage runs strong and deep, making for a richly explicated interior life that is more fully realized by the Thurlos than many of their peers in the genre. If you haven't met Ella before, her newest adventure will have you scrambling for her previous ones. This deft, fast-paced read pulses with danger and excitement on every page. --Jane Adams --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Product Description
Ella's life is about to change in ways she can barely begin to imagine--she is newly pregnant, and though she knows who the father is, she will not marry him. In Navajo society, her child will be of her clan, and will be accepted by her family, no matter what--but how can she stay a police officer, exposing herself and her unborn child to terrible danger day after day?
Given her current caseload, it's hard for Ella to put off making a final decision about her career. There's a near-riot at LabKote, a factory on the Reservation that produces high-quality vessels for medical labs. The Fierce Ones, an activist group of Navajo, are insisting that more native workers be hired by the firm--including a Navajo replacement for a manager recently found dead in his car, an apparent suicide. A sniper shoots at Ella as she drives to another crime scene--the home of State Senator James Yellowhair, who has been kidnapped.
Feuding between traditionalist and modernist elements in the Navajo nation heats up with sabotage, vandalism, and murder, spurred by a rise in birth defects among the Dineh's livestock and rustling of sheep and cattle. Ella's personal concerns mount when officers investigating a break-in at the health clinic discover that the records of several pregnant women--including Ella--are missing. Then one of the pregnant women is murdered....
