Chasing Away the Devil (signed)

When Sheriff Milt Kovak's sweetheart, Glenda Sue, is murdered, he must contend with her daughter, confront Glenda Sue's secret dark side, and find her murderer

Head deputy of Prophesy County, Okla., Milt Kovak, seen last in Other People's Houses , is well into middle age and still proposing marriage to his divorced childhood sweetheart, Glenda Sue. One rodeo night she refuses him yet again and won't even let him sleep in her trailer. Next day she is found covered with cigarette burns and with her throat cut. in her ransacked trail er. Though warned off the case by the sheriff because of his emotional involvement, Milt determines to investigate. Glenda Sue's daughter Melissa arrives from California with her small daughter, Rebecca, whose father is black. During their stay with Milt, Melissa is knocked out, Rebecca locked in the cellar and Milt's house torn apart. What are the bad guys looking for? Why had Glenda Sue bought a one-way airline ticket to Paris and how did she afford it? As Milt finds out after Rebecca's been kidnapped, the answers involve a group of racist right-wingers, a lot of dirty money and some "nice" local people. Despite some unlikely events (Milt's new love-at-first-sight; his recurring nightmare) this tale has real suspense and pace. Milt is a delightful narrator, both bemused and acerbic.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Recently divorced, tough-tender Milt Kovack, Deputy Sheriff of Prophesy County, Oklahoma (Other People's Houses, etc.), has proposed marriage to feisty waitress Glenda Sue and been rejected. A day later Glenda is found murdered in her vandalized house trailer. Milt notifies her long-estranged daughter Melissa, who has a small, half-black daughter of her own--Rebecca--and puts them up in his mountaintop house when they arrive from California for the funeral. That's scarcely over when Milt finds his own house torn apart--and Rebecca hidden, but unharmed, by masked men who leave behind a threatening note loaded with racist invective. An odd discovery in Glenda's locker at the hotel where she worked points to a possible motive for her murder, but events escalate into kidnapping and more killings before Milt makes a daring rescue, pinpoints a source of corruption, with help from the FBI, and finds a new ladylove. Cooper imbues her story with a strong sense of menace, a touch of the occult, an ironic final twist, and a sharply tuned ear for the gritty language of the area. Solid and satisfying. -- Copyright ©1991, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

Fourth in an American series, this title features Milton Kovak, chief sheriff's deputy in Prophesy County, Oklahoma. The morning after proposing to his life-long love, Glenda Sue, he learns that she has been murdered and frantically insists on finding her killer. Glenda Sue's estranged daughter and granddaughter arrive from California, immediately hit it off with Milt, then become embroiled in further troubles--some involving a local white supremacist organization. Distinctly down-home and rural in flavor, Cooper's lively characters and the antsy Milt keep things humming.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.