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Sam and Nicky Titus #3
The Down Home Heifer Heist
THIN ICE
It's a mean winter in Catlin County, Oklahoma, as modern-day rustlers are taking a deep cut out of the area's cattle production. The operation is slick...and murder is just another day's work.
Rancher Joe Pilkington, neighbor to Sheriff Sam Titus and photographer wife Nicky, is run down when he interrupts the rustlers during a heist. Aside from tire tracks in the snow, the only clue is the sound of Mozart heard playing from the killer's truck.
Two more grisly deaths follow, and it looks as if a beloved member of the Titus ranch may be accused of murder. Sam and Nicky grimly set out to corner a killer...before they become victims themselves.Rich in Oklahoma ambience and lore, witty, romantic, full of surprises, The Down Home Heifer Heist is the best yet in the charming Down Home series.
It's a mean winter in Catlin County, Oklahoma, as modern-day rustlers are taking a deep cut out of the area's cattle production. The operation is slick...and murder is just another day's work.
Rancher Joe Pilkington, neighbor to Sheriff Sam Titus and photographer wife Nicky, is run down when he interrupts the rustlers during a heist. Aside from tire tracks in the snow, the only clue is the sound of Mozart heard playing from the killer's truck.
Two more grisly deaths follow, and it looks as if a beloved member of the Titus ranch may be accused of murder. Sam and Nicky grimly set out to corner a killer...before they become victims themselves.Rich in Oklahoma ambience and lore, witty, romantic, full of surprises, The Down Home Heifer Heist is the best yet in the charming Down Home series.
- GenresMystery
252 pages, Paperback
First published May 1, 1993
27 people want to read
About the author
Eve K. Sandstrom
8 books22 followersAka JoAnna Carl
JoAnna Carl and Eve K. Sandstrom both write mystery novels which rely on regional settings for atmosphere, background and clues.
JoAnna writes about the shores of Lake Michigan and has been reviewed in Michigan newspapers as a “regional writer.”
Eve writes about Southwest Oklahoma and once won an award for the best book of the year with an Oklahoma setting.
It’s no particular secret that Eve and JoAnna occupy the same body.
Talk about your split personalities!
But how did this happen?
Eve K. Sandstrom is an Oklahoman to the teeth: she was born there, as were five previous generations of her mother’s family. Both her grandfathers and her father were in the oil business, once the backbone of Oklahoma’s economy. One grandmother was born in the Choctaw Nation, and Eve is a member of the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma. Eve and seven other members of her immediate family are graduates of the University of Oklahoma. Eve even knows the second verse of “Boomer Sooner.”
Eve wrote two mystery series: the “Down Home” books, set on a ranch in Southwest Oklahoma, and the Nell Matthews mysteries, semi-hard-boiled books laid in a mid-size city on the Southern Plains.
But Eve married a great guy whose family owned a cottage on the east coast of Lake Michigan, not far from the Michigan towns of Fennville, Saugatuck, and Douglas. Every summer for more than forty years she, her husband and various combinations of children and grandchildren have trekked to the community of Pier Cove for vacations that lasted from two weeks to three months.
The area features gorgeous beaches, lush orchards, thick woods, and beautiful Victorian houses. Eve grew to love it. So when her editor asked her to come up with a new, “cozy” mystery series, Eve set it in a West Michigan resort town, scrambling up Saugatuck, Douglas, South Haven, Holland, Manistee, Ludington and Muskegon with her own ideas of what a resort ought to be to create Warner Pier.
As further background, she plunked her heroine into a business which produces and sells luscious, luxurious, European-style bonbons, truffles and molded chocolates. Most small towns couldn’t support a business like this, but the resorts of West Michigan – with their wealthy “summer people” – can. The “Chocoholic Mysteries” were on their way.
Eve’s editor requested that she use a pen name for the new series, and Eve picked the middle names of her three children, Betsy Jo, Ruth Anna, and John Carl. “JoAnna Carl” was born.
So that’s how JoAnna/Eve became a regional author in two widely separated regions.
JoAnna/Eve earned a degree in journalism at the University of Oklahoma and also studied with Carolyn G. Hart and Jack Bickham in the OU Creative Writing Program. She spent more than twenty-five years in the newspaper business, working as a reporter, editor, and columnist at The Lawton Constitution in Lawton, Oklahoma. She took an early retirement to write fiction full-time.
She and her husband, David F. Sandstrom, have three grandchildren, whom they love introducing to the lore of their two homes – Oklahoma and Michigan.
JoAnna Carl and Eve K. Sandstrom both write mystery novels which rely on regional settings for atmosphere, background and clues.
JoAnna writes about the shores of Lake Michigan and has been reviewed in Michigan newspapers as a “regional writer.”
Eve writes about Southwest Oklahoma and once won an award for the best book of the year with an Oklahoma setting.
It’s no particular secret that Eve and JoAnna occupy the same body.
Talk about your split personalities!
But how did this happen?
Eve K. Sandstrom is an Oklahoman to the teeth: she was born there, as were five previous generations of her mother’s family. Both her grandfathers and her father were in the oil business, once the backbone of Oklahoma’s economy. One grandmother was born in the Choctaw Nation, and Eve is a member of the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma. Eve and seven other members of her immediate family are graduates of the University of Oklahoma. Eve even knows the second verse of “Boomer Sooner.”
Eve wrote two mystery series: the “Down Home” books, set on a ranch in Southwest Oklahoma, and the Nell Matthews mysteries, semi-hard-boiled books laid in a mid-size city on the Southern Plains.
But Eve married a great guy whose family owned a cottage on the east coast of Lake Michigan, not far from the Michigan towns of Fennville, Saugatuck, and Douglas. Every summer for more than forty years she, her husband and various combinations of children and grandchildren have trekked to the community of Pier Cove for vacations that lasted from two weeks to three months.
The area features gorgeous beaches, lush orchards, thick woods, and beautiful Victorian houses. Eve grew to love it. So when her editor asked her to come up with a new, “cozy” mystery series, Eve set it in a West Michigan resort town, scrambling up Saugatuck, Douglas, South Haven, Holland, Manistee, Ludington and Muskegon with her own ideas of what a resort ought to be to create Warner Pier.
As further background, she plunked her heroine into a business which produces and sells luscious, luxurious, European-style bonbons, truffles and molded chocolates. Most small towns couldn’t support a business like this, but the resorts of West Michigan – with their wealthy “summer people” – can. The “Chocoholic Mysteries” were on their way.
Eve’s editor requested that she use a pen name for the new series, and Eve picked the middle names of her three children, Betsy Jo, Ruth Anna, and John Carl. “JoAnna Carl” was born.
So that’s how JoAnna/Eve became a regional author in two widely separated regions.
JoAnna/Eve earned a degree in journalism at the University of Oklahoma and also studied with Carolyn G. Hart and Jack Bickham in the OU Creative Writing Program. She spent more than twenty-five years in the newspaper business, working as a reporter, editor, and columnist at The Lawton Constitution in Lawton, Oklahoma. She took an early retirement to write fiction full-time.
She and her husband, David F. Sandstrom, have three grandchildren, whom they love introducing to the lore of their two homes – Oklahoma and Michigan.
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
December 29, 2018
The Down Home series (a trilogy) is a good read. Sam and Nicky Titus are interesting and charming characters and they are a great team. The author’s descriptions of the land and the way of life are very interesting.
Highly recommended, especially to readers of the author’s Chocoholic Mystery series, written under the name JoAnna Carl.
Highly recommended, especially to readers of the author’s Chocoholic Mystery series, written under the name JoAnna Carl.
February 5, 2024
Cute mystery
September 8, 2007
Nicky and Sam Titus move to Oklahoma, where Sam gets a job as sheriff. Then the cattle rustlers moved in, and a rancher dies. The trouble escalates, and soon Nicky and Sam are targets themselves.
A good series that should have gotten more press.
A good series that should have gotten more press.
September 21, 2012
Too easy to figure out who the killer was.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews