Book description
Sleepy Benteen County, Kansas, turns frantic on election day. Sheriff
English, better known as Englishman, faces his toughest re-election
challenge yet. The radical religious right is out to unseat him, their
candidate an Iraq war hero. Englishman's only available deputy isn't
winning him votes. That very morning, while pursuing a vehicle, the
hurried deputy rams a school bus carrying the Benteen County teen choir.
Englishman's brother, Mad Dog, a born-again Cheyenne, rushes back from a
quest to the Black Hills. He has had a premonition that the sheriff is
in serious danger. Meanwhile, the sheriff's daughters, attending
separate colleges, wake with similar fears, cut classes, and hurry home
to keep their father safe. The sheriff believes the girls are the ones
in need of protection as election day grows ever wilder. A student
smuggles a gun into the school and begins shooting and taking hostages.
A private army has seized a nearby farm and holds citizens, including
Mad Dog, against their will. And, when he finds some spare time,
Englishman needs to clear up one little thing about his deputy's
accident: Benteen County doesn't have a teen choir. All this by sundown.
It's enough to make a sheriff wonder why he wants to serve another term.
The fourth story (after Prairie Gothic ) involving Mad Dog, a born-again
Cheyenne, and his brother, Sheriff English, better known as Englishman,
finds the Kansas sheriff running for re-election. Then a mysterious
early morning school bus accident involving his deputy threatens to cost
Englishman the election. Once again, Hayes crams his mystery with zany
characters, nonstop action, and multilevel plotlines all converging on
one Kansas farmhouse where something very strange is occurring. Hayes
lives in Tucson. J. M. Hayes was born and raised on the flat earth of
central Kansas where Prairie Gothic takes place. He graduated from
Wichita State University and did another three years of post graduate
work at the University of Arizona. He shares a home in Tucson, AZ with
his wife, several computers, four thousand or so books, and a small herd
of German Shepherds.
