HANK and FRIENDS: A Mystery created to support Animal Charities (Paperback) (ISBN-13: 9781539540854)

Life in a small county is usually quiet although sometimes filled with colorful, eccentric characters-both human and animal. A few fights here and there, a bout of drinking gone wrong-nothing too sinister. Not much of a challenge for a seasoned law-enforcement officer like Stone County Sheriff Caroline Tipton.

Until she gets a call from the local motel, the Second Honeymoon Hacienda. A Houston executive is reported missing by his wife, and the sheriff and her trusty bloodhound, Hank, are immediately on the case. But something isn't adding up.

After an initial search turns up little conclusive evidence, the remains of a car are found in a secluded ravine. Sheriff Tipton is taken aback when she learns the car is registered to the missing executive-but there is no sign of a body in the wreckage. Tipton teams up with a Houston detective and Sergeant Dan Jeffers, an experienced state trooper and friend, to decipher increasingly complicated and divergent clues.

In this suspenseful novel, author Cynthia P. Hillen seamlessly blends the essences of small-town life, romance, and crime solving-and commits to donating 75 percent of all royalties from its sale to animal-centered charities.