M K Coker

It all comes to a head... In a quiet roadside ditch in Eda County, South Dakota, prairie roses have sprung up along with constructions cones--and a fractured old skull. Settling into her first year as elected sheriff, Karen Okerlund Mehaffey wants nothing more than a quiet little murder with no press, no mess, while she tackles the more difficult question of whether to purchase a new official vehicle or hire a new deputy. Her detective-uncle, Marek Okerlund, has his own hands full with an unexpectedly recalcitrant daughter. School is almost out... but the last day comes sooner for some, as girls go missing, one by one.As the old case and the new intertwine, with twists that turn frighteningly personal, Karen and Marek rush to unravel the skull's past to save the girls' future.DEAD HEAD is a character-driven police procedural. Eighth in series. Word Count: 96,000. Occasional profanity. Minimal gore.

Nature's red in tooth and claw... After an election recount, Karen Mehaffey's triumphant return as the sheriff of Eda County, South Dakota, is marred by the murder of her opponent, Bob "Baby" Bunting. His desecrated body is found in a local park where tensions simmer between park management, homeless squatters, and struggling residents of the adjoining trailer park. Just off a high-profile case in Albuquerque where she'd been on the brink of accepting a new job, Karen wonders how much she wants to come home after all. For her uncle-detective, Marek Okerlund, the case means revisiting his family's grinding poverty in a ramshackle house that was never a home. Where survival of the fittest is a way of life, will Karen and Marek come out on top... or will the killer ruthlessly destroy their homecoming? DEAD POOR is a character-driven police procedural. Seventh in series. Word Count: 90,000. Occasional profanity. Minimal gore.

It's not just the sun's rays beaming down...After losing a brutal election, Sheriff Karen Mehaffey and her uncle, Detective Marek Okerlund, are headed from South Dakota to New Mexico for a long delayed vacation and job hunt. Marek hopes to reunite with his old homicide partner in Albuquerque, while Karen looks to resume her former career as a dispatcher. But when Marek's young daughter goes unexpectedly mute when their plane lands in the city of her mother's death, all plans are put on hold.Dispirited, they'd barely arrived at their motel when a man dies on their doorstep, proclaiming himself the victim of radiation poisoning. Crazy? Perhaps. But with his last words, the man snares their attention: he asks them to tell Karen's father back in South Dakota that he's sorry... but for what?Fated for a busman's holiday, Karen and Marek find themselves entangled in a case hotter than the New Mexico sun. DEAD HOT is a character-driven police procedural. Sixth in series. Word Count: 70,000. Occasional profanity. Minimal gore.

If it bleeds, it leads. Poised to win her first contested election in Eda County, South Dakota, Sheriff Karen Mehaffey is broadsided by bad news. Not only does a hooligan deface a turbine in the county's new wind farm, but Alyson Linderman, daughter of a Twin Cities media mogul, is found dead on the launch day of an electronics recycling center. Is it eco-terrorism in reverse or something more insidious? Branded as a bumbling pair of misfits, Karen and her detective-uncle, Marek Okerlund, must solve the high profile murder under a media microscope-or they'll both lose their jobs.DEAD NEWS is a character-driven police procedural of a rural bent. Fifth in series. Word Count: 91,000. Occasional profanity. Minimal gore.

The ties that bind-can kill.All's quiet in Reunion, South Dakota, until word comes via horse and buggy: a killer is loose in the peaceful German Anabaptist community of Eder.Outsiders call them the Mock Brethren, who only wish to be left alone. Sheriff Karen Mehaffey wants to do just that-they shunned her mother. But when the patriarch, Elder Abraham Mock, is killed, she reluctantly answers the call, more afraid to find kin than a killer.Except, that is, for the daughter she gave up two decades before.DEAD QUIET is a character-driven police procedural of a rural bent. Fourth in series. Occasional profanity. Minimal gore.

The trucker who'd hit a Wrong Way sign lay hunched over the wheels of his semi-with his brains blown to bits, a revolver in his hand. Leo Jurczewsky had long talked of killing himself. So when Sheriff Karen Mehaffey and Detective Marek Okerlund are called to the Reunion, South Dakota, exit ramp to investigate his death, they're ready to wrap up the case. But it all goes wrong when the pathologist rules the gunshot wasn't self-inflicted. So was it homicide-or a twisted form of assisted suicide? Then someone starts leaving drawings of crosshairs-gun sights-for various leaders in town, including Karen. If that wasn't enough, word comes of the suicide of someone close to her. Meanwhile, Marek takes in a heavily pregnant runaway-who looks far too much like his dead wife. As Karen and Marek try to follow a killer's wrong turn, they both get an inkling of why life can become too much to bear.DEAD WRONG is a character-driven police procedural of a rural bent. Third in series. Word Count: 86,000. Occasional profanity. Minimal gore.

Dreams can inspire, crush-and even kill.For Karen Mehaffey, going for the stars-the sheriff's stars-wasn't turning out to be a dream come true. Flood waters are rising along with the thermometer, and the last thing she needs is a homicide. Detective Marek Okerlund, on the other hand, welcomes any distraction from the anniversary of his wife's death and from his mother-in-law's unannounced visit. When Karen calls back her old classmate Adam Van Eck to look after his ailing mother, he reluctantly returns from pounding the boards on Broadway-and is found days later, shotgun in hand, with his mother planted dead in her garden.Who other than Adam could possibly want the retired schoolteacher dead? The only link to her life outside her garden is the Dream Team, a group of high school students dreaming up ways to revitalize the dying county of Eda, South Dakota.With the detritus of dead dreams all around, Karen and Marek must flush out a killer. Before the levee breaks.Neither cozy nor hardboiled, DEAD DREAMS is a character-driven police procedural of a rural bent. Second in series. Word Count: 91,000. Occasional profanity. Minimal gore.

This isn't your mother's Little House on the Prairie...Detective Marek Okerlund unknowingly passes by a dying man in a Dakota blizzard-and gets what he changed jobs to avoid: a homicide. Acting Sheriff Karen Mehaffey asks for a part-time detective to teach her the ropes and loses what she changed jobs to keep: peace in her family.Together, estranged detective and sheriff stand uneasily over the frozen body of Dale Hansen, operations manager at the local meat-packing plant. The intriguing words "White Out" are carved into one bare arm, the raw wrist chained to a barbed-wire fence. What does the message mean? Is it racial-as Dale wasn't popular with his Hispanic workers-or merely a weather report, done in understated Dakota style?Both Karen and Marek doubt their ability to give the victim justice. Karen is a former police dispatcher without a shred of investigative experience. Marek has enough experience for both of them, but he'd rather dust off his carpenter's license to save the last takeout restaurant in town from hooligans. Besides, saving his half-Hispanic, motherless daughter from starvation is a higher priority for him than arguing with a hard-headed sheriff. They'll both be out in the cold, though, if they can't put aside their differences to find a killer.Neither cozy nor hardboiled, DEAD WHITE is a character-driven police procedural of a rural bent. Word Count: 115,000. Occasional profanity. Minimal gore.REVIEWDEAD WHITE's characters seemed to walk right out of a familiar Dakota town, bickering with every step. I couldn't stop reading -Linda M. Hasselstrom, Author of No Place Like Home