Preacher Fakes a Miracle

Amateur sleuth Evan Wycliff is a disillusioned divinity student who is fascinated by astrophysics and given up both.

He's returned to his small-town farm roots in Southern Missouri. He is also disappointed in love. His beautiful fiancé was a brilliant Jewish scientist, a defense contractor who was killed in a rocket attack in Syria. These days Evan gets guest preacher gigs and uses his investigative skills as skip tracer for the local car and tractor dealership.

In this second novel in the series, Evan counsels a boy who is afflicted with schizophrenia and has been accused of rape. Along with related abuses of the child welfare system, he uncovers a teen trafficking ring run out of a luxury casino resort by a Russian oligarch.

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This is literature masquerading as a mystery. Carefully yet powerfully, Gerald Jones creates a small, stunning world in a tiny midwestern town, infusing each character with not just life but wit, charm and occasionally menace. This is the kind of writing one expects from John Irving or Jane Smiley. - Marvin J. Wolf, author of the Rabbi Ben Mysteries, including A Scribe Dies in Brooklyn

Some troubled teens are in much more trouble than they realize.

The gentrification of Missouri farmland has brought not only casino culture but also investors and influencers from all over the world. Evan Wycliff, a lapsed Baptist minister and unconfessed agnostic, often gets dragged into dealing with problems others have given up solving. There's an orphanage that serves young women, and some get placed in part-time work at the lakeside resorts.

They're supposed to be working in the laundry. But some have been pushed upstairs.

And then one went missing...

From M.J. Richards, Coauthor of Dishonor Thy Father:

A fast-moving mystery with twists and surprises that take you in unexpected directions. Jones is adept at creating unique and fascinating characters. His mystery sleuth is a part-timer with lots of heart who splits his time between religion, skip tracing and sometimes the metaphysical. The hero's search for a missing girl and his interactions with various eccentric individuals in the small town make him both sympathetic and compelling. A bit of a shock to learn what's really going on with the abducted young unwed mother... and amazing how it relates to real stories in the news today.

From Pamela Jaye Smith, Mythworks, Award-Winning Writer-Director-Producer:

As anyone who’s spent time in a small town the American Midwest knows, there’s a lot more going on behind the scenes than you’d expect. Or suspect. And there are plenty of suspects in the latest Evan Wycliff mystery by Gerald Everett Jones. Preacher Fakes a Miracle haunted my dreams as I read it, in the way that a good story about a bad situation should. I’m looking forward to reading the next installment of the Evan Wycliff mystery series.

From Morrie Ruvinsky, Author of Meeting God or Something Like It and The Heart and Other Strangers:

This time the Preacher digs even deeper, faster, and funnier than his prize-winning debut. It’s just what you’d expect, except everything you expect is wrong because the Preacher, in the very talented hands of Gerald Jones, is always at least a step ahead in this very satisfying second time out of the gate.

They bring him problems no one else wants to solve.

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