Dyed in the Wool is a suspense novel set in the southwest and the Navajo Nation. Environmental issues are central, as is the Navajo way of life, and weaving. When Annie McLeod’s car is rammed and shoved into a ditch in the dead of night, she knows that something criminal is afoot on the Navajo reservation.

She and her stepsons are injured in the crash, the latest in a string of problems. First, an experimental testing device showed toxins in reservation stream water; then Navajo weavers confided they believed something was wrong with their wool.

Scientists solve problems, and Annie, a chemist, is determined to uncover the threats facing the Navajo people. From the analytical lab where she works in Phoenix, to the craggy mountains and remote canyons of the vast reservation, Annie’s quest uncovers a deadly business, where the stakes keep rising and not everyone comes out alive.

A prize winner in the 2012 Bethlehem Writers Roundtable Short Story contest, Joyce Lekas, a writer of nonfiction for many years, has recently turned her hand to fiction. In her professional career, primarily in Silicon Valley, California, Lekas ghostwrote and published extensively in the business, analytical, and electronics press, and edited and published several technical books. She retired to the Southwest and now lives in Oregon.

Dyed in the Wool is now available in print and Kindle versions from Amazon, and on the Nook from Barnes and Noble.

OWC member Joyce Lekas is one of three winners in this year’s Bethlehem Writers Group short story contest. Her story “The Old Neighborhood” will be published on Bethlehem’s web site during the month of July 2012. Find it here. (Click on the “Short Story Award” tab.)