Through a labyrinth of towering book cases, over a few haphazardly stacked rare books seemingly lost between the cracks of time and past the ghosts of Shakespeare and Thackeray, a book club meeting is interrupted by the announcement of the first murder in the town of Good Hope, New Mexico. The victim is Good Hope’s eccentric book collector, whose body is found between the shelves of his massive book collection. Chief Dockerty calls upon bookshop owner and ex-detective Sharecross to solve the crime. As the team makes its way through the town which is alive with the titters of gossip and hysteria, it becomes apparent that the motive for this brutal crime lies with a book that has a blood soaked past tracing back to the days of Cortez. 

Filled with a slew of curious characters set against the tumbleweed New Mexico town, this Mysterious Bookshop original short story from Loren D. Estleman is American hard-boiled crime fiction at its best.

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