Because of the Bly family project of finishing husband and father Stephen Bly’s last novel, Stuart Brannon’s Final Shot, I’m fascinated with other’s tales. This is another author carrying on the family heritage. I recently read about Tony Hillerman’s daughter, Anne Hillerman. She determined to keep his Navajo mystery series going.

     Anne Hillerman, the daughter of New Mexico’s bestselling mystery author the late Tony Hillerman, continues her father’s popular series. She has published a fresh new Navajo Country mystery, her debut novel,  Spider Woman’s Daughter. According to reviewers, this novel is filled with captivating lore and startling suspense. It’s got bold new characters and the rich atmosphere of the Southwest. A recent Santa Fe event calendar tells more about the project:  http://www.santafe.com/calendar/event/anne-hillerman-launches-spider-womans-daughter

      Anne Hillerman’s debut novel, Spider Woman’s Daughter, is a mystery that includes the Navajo Nation and Santa Fe. The book follows the trail of the Navajo detectives her father Tony Hillerman created. The further adventures of the characters Tony Hillerman made famous: Jim Chee, Joe Leaphorn and Bernadette Manuelito.

Navajo Nation Police Officer Bernadette Manualito witnesses the cold-blooded shooting of someone very close to her. With the victim fighting for his life, the entire squad and the local FBI office are hell-bent on catching the gunman. Bernie, too, wants in on the investigation. Despite regulations forbidding eyewitness involvement. But that doesn’t mean she’s going to sit idly by. Especially when her husband, Sergeant Jim Chee, is in charge of finding the shooter.

Bernie and Chee discover that a cold case involving his former boss and partner, retired Inspector Joe Leaphorn, may hold the key. Digging into the old investigation, husband and wife find themselves inching closer to the truth. And closer to a killer determined to prevent justice from taking its course.

She shares in an article, “Passing the Torch,” in The Costco Connection.

“We’d be at dinner when I was growing up and, inevitably, Dad would share with us about the novel he was working on. It was like Leaphorn and Chee were at dinner with us every night, enjoying with us the puzzles of life. They were kind of like my uncles.”

Anne Hillerman and husband Don Strel will guide a series of trips for Road Scholars based on their award–winning book Tony Hillerman’s Landscape: On the Road with Chee and Leaphorn. Anne Hillerman’s first novel Spider Woman’s Daughter (HarperCollins) debuted Oct. 1, 2013. The 19th Leaphorn and Chee novel. It became a New York Times Bestseller in its first week on the shelves. Check out her website: http://annehillerman.com/

 

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     You might also enjoy the Stephen Bly western romance adventure series set in New Mexico: The Belles of Lordsburg Series. The novels include The Senator’s Other Daughter, The General’s Notorious Widow, and The Outlaw’s Twin Sister (a Christy Award Finalist). Click here to find out more: https://www.blybooks.com/product_category/historical-western-novels/page/2/

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Newbery Medalist author Jean Craighead George’s children completed her final novel. Author of more than 100 children’s books, she died in 2012 at the age of 92. She was in the process of writing Ice Whale, a middle-grade novel about a bowhead whale’s 200-year bond with an Eskimo clan in northern Alaska. Here’s the Publisher’s Weekly story:  http://bit.ly/1mnIvX1