Overview
Carl Herbold is a cold-blooded psychopath who has just escaped the penitentiary where he was serving a life sentence. Bent on revenge, he's going back to where he began—Blewer County, Texas...
Born deaf, lately widowed, Anna Corbett fights to keep the ranch that is her son's birthright, unaware that she is at the center of Herbold's horrific scheme—and that her world of self-imposed isolation is about to explode...
Drifter Jack Sawyer arrives at Anna's ranch asking for work, hoping to protect the innocent woman and her son from Herbold's rage. But Sawyer can't outrun the secrets that stalk him—or the day of reckoning awaiting them all...
Synopsis
Carl Herbold is a cold-blooded psychopath who has just escaped the penitentiary where he was serving a life sentence. Bent on revenge, he's going back to where he began—Blewer County, Texas...
Born deaf, lately widowed, Anna Corbett fights to keep the ranch that is her son's birthright, unaware that she is at the center of Herbold's horrific scheme—and that her world of self-imposed isolation is about to explode...
Drifter Jack Sawyer arrives at Anna's ranch asking for work, hoping to protect the innocent woman and her son from Herbold's rage. But Sawyer can't outrun the secrets that stalk him—or the day of reckoning awaiting them all...
Publishers Weekly
A 20-year-old unsolved murder in a small East Texas town sets the stage for this fast-paced and romantically charged, if stiffly written, thriller, the latest (after Fat Tuesday) from the prolific Brown.
Everyone in Blewer, Texas, assumes that the nefarious Herbold brothers, Carl and Cecil, murdered Patsy McCorkle two decades ago, but neither was ever charged with the killing. Carl, the more menacing brother, has spent those decades in an Arkansas prison for an unrelated crime. But now Carl has escaped and Blewer residents fear he might come back to town. Local rancher Delray Corbett has more to fear than most -- the Herbolds are his estranged stepsons. So when drifter Jack Sawyer swaggers onto Delray's ranch looking for work, Delray hires him, thinking that Jack's presence will ease his mind regarding the safety of his deaf, widowed daughter-in-law, Anna, and her five-year-old son, David. But Delray doesn't know that Jake has a closer connection to Blewer, and to the Corbetts, than he's letting on.
Brown's deftly plotted narrative twists and turns without losing hold of its suspense. Her characters are fully fleshed out, and she pays particular attention to Anna's situation as a deaf woman facing ignorance in a rural community. Some graphic sex and violence and the voices of these east Texan good (and bad) ol' boys animate this harrowing tale of crime, revenge and redemption.
Editorials
Publishers Weekly -
A 20-year-old unsolved murder in a small East Texas town sets the stage for this fast-paced and romantically charged, if stiffly written, thriller, the latest (after Fat Tuesday) from the prolific Brown.Everyone in Blewer, Texas, assumes that the nefarious Herbold brothers, Carl and Cecil, murdered Patsy McCorkle two decades ago, but neither was ever charged with the killing. Carl, the more menacing brother, has spent those decades in an Arkansas prison for an unrelated crime. But now Carl has escaped and Blewer residents fear he might come back to town. Local rancher Delray Corbett has more to fear than most -- the Herbolds are his estranged stepsons. So when drifter Jack Sawyer swaggers onto Delray's ranch looking for work, Delray hires him, thinking that Jack's presence will ease his mind regarding the safety of his deaf, widowed daughter-in-law, Anna, and her five-year-old son, David. But Delray doesn't know that Jake has a closer connection to Blewer, and to the Corbetts, than he's letting on.
Brown's deftly plotted narrative twists and turns without losing hold of its suspense. Her characters are fully fleshed out, and she pays particular attention to Anna's situation as a deaf woman facing ignorance in a rural community. Some graphic sex and violence and the voices of these east Texan good (and bad) ol' boys animate this harrowing tale of crime, revenge and redemption.
Library Journal
Deaf widow Anna Corbett, her young son, and her father-in-law hire a drifter, Jack Sawyer, as a handyman on their small east Texas ranch. There's much to do around the place since Anna's husband died and his two wild stepbrothers were sent up for murder. Patriarch Delray Corbett wants to preserve the ranch despite increasing pressure from a smarmy developer. Jack's a hard worker, and he's deeply attracted to Anna and young David. Meanwhile, evil stepbrother Carl escapes from prison and sets off a chain reaction of robbery, brutality, and murder as he moves ever closer to the Corbett ranch. He's bent on revenge for being nailed by his daddy for a murder he claims he didn't commit. As the story plays out in a maelstrom of death and destruction, it becomes increasingly clear that Jack holds the key to Carl's alibi, an unsolved murder, and the mystery surrounding Anna's self-imposed silence.Brown (Fat Tuesday, LJ 5/1/97) is a master at weaving a story of romance, action, and suspense into a tight web that catches and holds the reader from first page to last. This is sure to be a hit with fans of her previous works and gain her an even wider readership. Highly recommended.
--Susan Clifford, Aerospace Corp., El Segundo, CA
Library Journal
Deaf widow Anna Corbett, her young son, and her father-in-law hire a drifter, Jack Sawyer, as a handyman on their small east Texas ranch. There's much to do around the place since Anna's husband died and his two wild stepbrothers were sent up for murder. Patriarch Delray Corbett wants to preserve the ranch despite increasing pressure from a smarmy developer. Jack's a hard worker, and he's deeply attracted to Anna and young David. Meanwhile, evil stepbrother Carl escapes from prison and sets off a chain reaction of robbery, brutality, and murder as he moves ever closer to the Corbett ranch. He's bent on revenge for being nailed by his daddy for a murder he claims he didn't commit. As the story plays out in a maelstrom of death and destruction, it becomes increasingly clear that Jack holds the key to Carl's alibi, an unsolved murder, and the mystery surrounding Anna's self-imposed silence.Brown (Fat Tuesday, LJ 5/1/97) is a master at weaving a story of romance, action, and suspense into a tight web that catches and holds the reader from first page to last. This is sure to be a hit with fans of her previous works and gain her an even wider readership. Highly recommended.
--Susan Clifford, Aerospace Corp., El Segundo, CA
Kirkus Reviews
Styleless and cliche-besotted though the works of the queen of Texas melodrama may be, her last novel—1997's Mardi Gras sleaze extravaganza Fat Tuesday—got a first printing of 500,000 and the nod from two book clubs.Here, convicted killer Carl Herbold escapes from Tucker prison and heads for East Texas. Drifter Jack Sawyer, with whom Herbold has a fatal destiny, has also arrived in East Texas and landed a job at a cattle ranch where deaf widow Anna Corbett and five-year-old son David live with her father-in-law—and where the vile acts of Herbold will be played out. Will Sawyer get "unspeakable" Anna to speak at last?
Most Texans who read this will think these pages, with their strong Texas twang singing through, could have dropped from their own mouths. And they did.