A Longer Fall

In this second thrilling installment of the Gunnie Rose series, Lizbeth Rose is hired onto a new crew for a seemingly easy protection job, transporting a crate into Dixie, just about the last part of the former United States of America she wants to visit. But what seemed like a straight-forward job turns into a massacre as the crate is stolen. Up against a wall in Dixie, where social norms have stepped back into the last century, Lizbeth has to go undercover with an old friend to retrieve the crate as what’s inside can spark a rebellion, if she can get it back in time.
#1 New York Times bestselling author Charlaine Harris (Sookie Stackhouse mysteries and Midnight, Texas trilogy) is at her best here, building the world of this alternate history of the United States, where magic is an acknowledged but despised power.
"The land outside was open to view till there was a ridge of low hills. The sun was beginning to cast long shadows for the small trees, the few farms. The towns were far apart in this stretch of Texoma. We’d gone through miles that were entirely empty. The population of Texoma wasn’t what it had been before the fields dried up and the farms got repossessed and the influenza took people from every family. When it had still been Texas. Our car was half-empty. Not too many passengers wanted to share space with gunnies. My new crew, the Lucky Crew, was all in the same half-drugged condition I was. Across the aisle, gray-whiskered Charlie Chop was out and out snoring. Rogelio was staring out the window looking angry and handsome, which seemed to be his resting face. Jake, the crew leader who’d hired me, was looking ahead resolutely, making sure he was alert. He and I had run out of things to talk about thirty minutes before. Jake and I were turned toward Maddy, who was about my age, as she sat on the crate. That crate was our cargo."