Coffin Man: A Charlie Moon Mystery

Charlie Moon looks into several puzzles that confound Scott Paris, the Granite Creek, Colo., police chief, in Doss’s amusing 16th adventure featuring the Ute Indian part-time deputy and full-time rancher (after 2010’s A Dead Man’s Tale). Doss’s old-fashioned narrative voice, including asides to the reader, sets out a number of story lines: irascible Daisy Perika, Charlie’s aunt, has lost her ability to see the dead, and doesn’t take the loss well; Wanda Naranjo’s pregnant, unmarried teenage daughter, Betty, leaves to keep a nonexistent appointment with her counselor, Dr. Stuart Whyte, then disappears; Wanda thinks her own no-account boyfriend, Mike Kauffmann, may know where she is; and pretty 19-year-old Sarah Frank, the Ute-Papago orphan who lives at Charlie’s Columbine ranch, meets a mysterious stranger, dashing Capt. Erasmus Boyle. A body in a graveyard and another on a tiny river island demand investigation. Series fans will enjoy spending time with old friends. (Nov.)