Coffin man

the long version

Charlie Moon looks into several puzzles that confound Scott Paris, the Granite Creek, Colo., police chief, in Doss’s amusing 16th adventure featuring the Ute Indian part-time deputy and full-time rancher (after 2010’s A Dead Man’s Tale). Doss’s old-fashioned narrative voice, including asides to the reader, sets out a number of story lines: irascible Daisy Perika, Charlie’s aunt, has lost her ability to see the dead, and doesn’t take the loss well; Wanda Naranjo’s pregnant, unmarried teenage daughter, Betty, leaves to keep a nonexistent appointment with her counselor, Dr. Stuart Whyte, then disappears; Wanda thinks her own no-account boyfriend, Mike Kauffmann, may know where she is; and pretty 19-year-old Sarah Frank, the Ute-Papago orphan who lives at Charlie’s Columbine ranch, meets a mysterious stranger, dashing Capt. Erasmus Boyle. A body in a graveyard and another on a tiny river island demand investigation. Series fans will enjoy spending time with old friends. (Nov.)