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A Fragment Too Far
A Sheriff Luke McWhorter Mystery
Book #1 of A Sheriff Luke McWhorter Mystery
By Dudley Lynch
Published by ECW Press
Distributed by Simon & Schuster
Table of Contents
About The Book
True Detective meets X-Files in the first installment of the Luke McWhorter series
Nine physicists are dead. The medical examiner has determined that the victims died from drinking coffee laced with rat poison. The owner of the house, Professor Thaddeus Huntgardner, isn’t suspected, but his claim that a piece of the debris from Roswell’s 1947 UFO crash was hidden in Flagler might be true. Enter Luther “Luke” Stephens McWhorter, a Yale Divinity School–educated West Texas sheriff with all the right questions.
Is the fragment real? If so, who is trying to locate it? And what has fueled the byzantine activities of Abbot County’s two secret societies for the past 70 years? Working with FBI agent and girlfriend, Angie Steele, Sheriff Luke begins to put together all the pieces and come to understand the connection between seemingly unrelated phenomena.
Nine physicists are dead. The medical examiner has determined that the victims died from drinking coffee laced with rat poison. The owner of the house, Professor Thaddeus Huntgardner, isn’t suspected, but his claim that a piece of the debris from Roswell’s 1947 UFO crash was hidden in Flagler might be true. Enter Luther “Luke” Stephens McWhorter, a Yale Divinity School–educated West Texas sheriff with all the right questions.
Is the fragment real? If so, who is trying to locate it? And what has fueled the byzantine activities of Abbot County’s two secret societies for the past 70 years? Working with FBI agent and girlfriend, Angie Steele, Sheriff Luke begins to put together all the pieces and come to understand the connection between seemingly unrelated phenomena.
Excerpt
Drasher sent a glance toward the FBI special agent in the room. Angie raised her eyebrows and gave her head a tiny tilt. His call. “One of our major U.S. aerospace companies runs it.”
“And its purpose is what?”
“First and foremost, to cover any government official’s ass that needs covering.”
“Sounds like a big job. Any particular ass-covering specialty?
He unleashed a huge sigh. Laid his hands in his lap. And entwined his fingers. More silence. Maybe he was deciding on his answer. Or deciding whether he was going to answer. Or deciding whether to abort his whole mission.
Then he seemed to realize he’d already crossed this Rubicon and needed to get to the point. “We operate at the bottom of the rabbit hole.”
“No idea where to go with that.”
Drasher said his private intelligence agency’s responsibility was to investigate UFO sightings, legitimate or otherwise. In the U.S. or anywhere else in the world when something interested them. Sightings by civilians, military personnel, local law enforcement, pilots or, as had once happened, the governor of Arizona. Sightings by anyone. But especially, sightings by anyone who might be intimidated by the noxious political correctness attitudes in the federal government.
That was the rabbit hole.
The need for it could be traced all the way back to Roswell. Within hours of that momentous summer day in 1947, the generals who ran the Army Air Forces were running for cover. Petrified by the fear that anyone might think they thought they were dealing with a real UFO crash.
Lying about what had happened in the remote New Mexico countryside. Confiscating every piece of evidence of the crashed UFO they could lay hands on. Warning witnesses of the most drastic penalties if they ever breathed a word about what they saw. Insisting that people should forget that their lying eyes had seen anything.
Seventy-plus years later, he said, little had changed. To this day, nothing spooked officials at all levels of the American government more than being accused of treating UFOs and extraterrestrial visitors as real possibilities. Thus, the rabbit hole.
He couldn’t—or wouldn’t—tell me which POTUS had created the IRAD solution. Said Truman would have if he’d thought of it. Or Eisenhower. Even Nixon.
“But one of them finally realized we needed a rabbit hole. Literally. A hole in our intelligence capabilities where serious UFO and alien visitation researchers could disappear. And deal with their data in total privacy. That’s what my IRAD does. It’s been the only way to get around the official timidity and look seriously at the evidence.”
“Your IRAD squad. It’s been active in Flagler for a while?”
“We’ve come and gone and come and gone and, now, we’ve been back for three years. Chalk it up mostly to the erratic Professor Huntgardner and his claims and stories about his fragment. They’re like Tootle, the Little Engine—they just keep going. And coming. And now they’re getting people killed. One of our people, too, to our profound regret.”
“And its purpose is what?”
“First and foremost, to cover any government official’s ass that needs covering.”
“Sounds like a big job. Any particular ass-covering specialty?
He unleashed a huge sigh. Laid his hands in his lap. And entwined his fingers. More silence. Maybe he was deciding on his answer. Or deciding whether he was going to answer. Or deciding whether to abort his whole mission.
Then he seemed to realize he’d already crossed this Rubicon and needed to get to the point. “We operate at the bottom of the rabbit hole.”
“No idea where to go with that.”
Drasher said his private intelligence agency’s responsibility was to investigate UFO sightings, legitimate or otherwise. In the U.S. or anywhere else in the world when something interested them. Sightings by civilians, military personnel, local law enforcement, pilots or, as had once happened, the governor of Arizona. Sightings by anyone. But especially, sightings by anyone who might be intimidated by the noxious political correctness attitudes in the federal government.
That was the rabbit hole.
The need for it could be traced all the way back to Roswell. Within hours of that momentous summer day in 1947, the generals who ran the Army Air Forces were running for cover. Petrified by the fear that anyone might think they thought they were dealing with a real UFO crash.
Lying about what had happened in the remote New Mexico countryside. Confiscating every piece of evidence of the crashed UFO they could lay hands on. Warning witnesses of the most drastic penalties if they ever breathed a word about what they saw. Insisting that people should forget that their lying eyes had seen anything.
Seventy-plus years later, he said, little had changed. To this day, nothing spooked officials at all levels of the American government more than being accused of treating UFOs and extraterrestrial visitors as real possibilities. Thus, the rabbit hole.
He couldn’t—or wouldn’t—tell me which POTUS had created the IRAD solution. Said Truman would have if he’d thought of it. Or Eisenhower. Even Nixon.
“But one of them finally realized we needed a rabbit hole. Literally. A hole in our intelligence capabilities where serious UFO and alien visitation researchers could disappear. And deal with their data in total privacy. That’s what my IRAD does. It’s been the only way to get around the official timidity and look seriously at the evidence.”
“Your IRAD squad. It’s been active in Flagler for a while?”
“We’ve come and gone and come and gone and, now, we’ve been back for three years. Chalk it up mostly to the erratic Professor Huntgardner and his claims and stories about his fragment. They’re like Tootle, the Little Engine—they just keep going. And coming. And now they’re getting people killed. One of our people, too, to our profound regret.”
Product Details
- Publisher: ECW Press (October 16, 2019)
- Length: 352 pages
- ISBN13: 9781770414990
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Raves and Reviews
“An unusual lead, page-turning suspense, and a crackerjack plot help make this a winner … The X-Files fans will be eager for the next instalment.” — Publishers Weekly
“Lynch’s series debut offers a sharp, engaging hero and a mystery that amiably simmers.” — Kirkus Reviews
“An engaging narrative voice, likeable hero, and unpredictable plot make for an outstanding mystery debut!” — Jay Brandon, Edgar Award-nominated author of Fade the Heat and Shadow Knight’s Mate
Joe Holley, writer of The Houston Chronicle’s weekly “Native Texan” column, calls Lynch a “clever and quirky” author who has pulled off an “unlikely” plot “with panache.”
“[A] superb writer [who] deftly guides you through apocalyptic terrorism, academic over-reach, religion as entertainment, the chances of fate, the sustenance of friendship, and the hunger for love, all out in the sunbaked badlands of West Texas.” — Victor L. Hunter, co-author of The New York Times-reviewed novel Living Dogs and Dead Lions
“[Dudley Lynch] has done the almost impossible. He has turned Raiders of the Lost Ark into a Sunday School lesson.… There is a film there!” — Robert M. Randolph, Chaplain at Massachusetts Institute of Technology
“Lynch takes Sheriff Luke McWhorter and the reader on a wild ride through the West Texas prairie to deliver a bang of a story.” — Stephanie Jaye Evans, author of the Sugar Land Mystery Series
“A Fragment Too Far is a gripping thriller as full of twists and turns as a mountain road. Lynch’s beloved sheriff works through a situation combining a very real West Texas setting and its history, science, and what we all sincerely hope is science fiction. A first class read.” — Rose Williams, Latin and English instructor, McMurry University, and author of Caesar’s Blood
“Make room for author Dudley Lynch and protagonist Sheriff McWhorter in the Mystery Fiction Big Time. A Fragment Too Far delivers.” — Carlton Stowers, two-time winner of the Edgar Award
“Dudley Lynch’s A Fragment Too Far is a pretty entertaining police procedural and political intrigue.” — Winnipeg Free Press
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- Book Cover Image (jpg): A Fragment Too Far Trade Paperback 9781770414990
