The night before a funeral that will thrust the mountain town of Gainesboro, North Carolina, into the national spotlight, the body is stolen from the embalming room and funeral director Barry Clayton is knocked unconscious. Ouch. How will Clayton & Clayton deal with the relatives of Y'Grok Eban, the Montagnard hero who aided US troops during the Vietnam War, or the U.S. Senator, three-star general, and famous Hollywood star en route to Y'Grok's service? Barry's friend, Sheriff Tommy Lee Wadkins has a very personal interest in the missing Y'Grok - the Montagnard had saved his life. So does the Boston detective who also owes his life to Y'Grok and received a deathbed summons from the cancer-stricken old man: ''Raven has come home.'' The three men pledge to crack Y'Grok's code, recover not just the body but a piece of a long-buried past, and deal with new death and betrayal. Is it a heroic or a foolish undertaking?
A native of western North Carolina, Mark sets most of his mysteries in Asheville and the surrounding Appalachian mountains. In addition to his Sam Blackman and Barry Clayton series, Mark has written two Young Adult mysteries: a thriller, A CONSPIRACY OF GENES, set in a children's hospital and an historical "locked-room" murder mystery, DEATH ON A SOUTHERN BREEZE, set on a train traveling from Charlotte to Charleston in the summer of 1860. Mark also has written the play "A DYING BUSINESS" and two short stories, TWO OF A KIND, available for the Kindle.
His most recent novel is the thriller THE 13th TARGET set in Washington D.C. For a sneak preview or for a tour of Sam Blackman's Asheville or a preview of his latest Sam Blackman mystery, THE SANDBURG CONNECTION, check out the video section of his author page.