Coyote Willows is a modern day environmental thriller filled with murder, mercenaries and mysticism wrapped in the virulent legacy of the western hemisphere’s most deadly nuclear complex.
Major Jake Hawthorn, assigned to Homeland Security and struggling with PTSD, is warned off investigating a friend’s missing “Imminent Threat” report. Returning home to find his friend has died in a fiery crash, Jake turns to a native shaman for help in deciphering rock art clues leading to the murderer. Jake uncovers more than a killer and races the clock to expose a complex conspiracy sixty years in the making, as the land he loves teeters on the brink of an ecological Armageddon.
Coyote Willows is a fast paced, complex thriller with an original plot that kept me reading until the end.”
— Phillip Margolin, New York Times bestselling author of Woman with a Gun
As a fifth-generation Oregonian, growing up in the shadow of radioactive drift from the Hanford Nuclear Reservation, Sharon Appleman was inspired to set the novel in the high-desert country of the Pacific Northwest.
As the great-granddaughter of a Native American, ancient rock art still hidden on family ranch lands holds special resonance for her and plays a pivotal role in this fast-paced thriller. Coyote Willows is now available on Amazon, Kindle and at select bookstores. A book launch and signing will take place at the Seventh Annual NW Book Festival on July 25 in Portland.
Sharon, Congratulations! Just read about the publication of your novel. Can’t wait to read it.–Bruce
I’m hearing great things about this book!
Here is what Rosemary Douglas Lombard said about the book; “I zoomed through COYOTE WILLOWS with great excitement and pleasure. I’m not usually a thriller reader, so I was delighted that Appleman’s book has much more to offer than the usual genre book: fine writing, complex plotting, and–so important–a well-researched core of the eco part of an eco-thriller: the huge issues of the Hanford nuclear facility’s radioactive legacy for the Pacific Northwest and its Columbia River. I loved, too, how the Native Americans and their cultural legacy of rock art became an important part of the story, as does place, based on Appleman’s own heritage of growing up on a ranch east of Oregon’s Mount Hood (and south of Hanford). Clearly, this author cares deeply about Jake and the issues that he–and we–must face: Hanford is the Pacific Northwest’s other Big One. Thank you, Sharon Appleman, for leading us to care. Highly recommended.”
Thank you for your glowing report. I especially like the idea of referring to Hanford as the PNW “other Big One.”……it is!