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Willi Gallagher is taking the morning train from Austin to her home in Nickleberry, Texas near Fort Worth. She's a teacher and is afraid her superintendent, who is always teasing her about her Comanche / Irish heritage, will be angry with her if she's late. She is also trying to avoid Texas Ranger, Quannah Lassiter, an Indian who speaks Lakota. We also meet a couple of politicians, a retired schoolteacher, the porter, Uzell Speer, a young Jamaican man, and the politician's PR person, Elvis are also on the train. After a delay occasioned by one of the politicians making speeches to his acolytes, the train leaves, but within a short while is stopped because a blizzard has made the tracks too hazardous to continue. Luckily for the travelers, there is an hotel not too far away, so they trek through the snow to the relative comfort of the old building, run by 3 elderly people. Of course, the hotel is shortly completely isolated by the blizzard, but the travelers have a good dinner, prepared by the strange man who runs the hotel. Willi brings a bowl of soup up to the porter, who has a bad cold and has taken something to help him to sleep, and shortly thereafter the congressman is found in the parlor with his throat slit. Since Quannah and Willi have a history, in fact, Willi seems to be somewhat psychic where Quannah is concerned, he promptly has her help him to solve the crime. It's hard to understand why a major publishing house would release a book as bad as this one. It's almost a young adult romance with a murder and some woo-woo elements thrown in. The author writes Uzell Speer's dialect so badly as to be incomprehensible, and even when one of the characters loses his false teeth, the vagaries of his speech remain the same as those caused by ill fitting dentures. Quannah and Willi spend a night outside in the blizzard, but where would a Texan get clothing and camping equipment suitable for that kind of weather. Skip this one and seek out some of the good books being published by regional publishers, and, dare I say it, even by iUniverse. You may be more than pleasantly surprised.
Reviewed by Barbara Franchi, May 2002
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