Showing results by narrator "Ron Varela" in All Categories

Was Lee Harvey Oswald a patsy, the fall guy in a sinister plot to assassinate President John F. Kennedy? Was Oswald the lone nut assassin like the Warren Commission claimed him to be? Tom Regan didn't believe the Warren Commission report, but he couldn't dispute their findings without having any tangible proof, evidence that Oswald had a double and he was caught up in a vast conspiracy.

True-Detective Mystery author Ben Newman has written about scores of murders, and thinks he has seen it all, until he is confronted with murders of adults from his childhood neighborhood. The first is his brother’s wife, her body found floating in the family swimming pool. Suspicion immediately falls on Ben’s brother, the good doctor. The death of a childhood friend turned pharmacist, and then a former flame of Ben’s turns the investigation away from Ben’s brother.

Jake Hines is a stubborn detective with a murky past now living outside Minneapolis where the city meets the prairie. He’s a little out of place in a place where the winters are long and the men are rugged, but he’s got more to worry about than just fitting in. There’s a serial killer on the loose leaving behind three murders, two suspects and a lot of unanswered questions. One victim was found laying on home plate in a neighborhood softball diamond, another was found disfigured and wearing an old softball uniform.

The town used to be a safe haven from the problems of the big city. Now many youth in the town are turning to drugs. Jake knows many of these kids in the crumbling downtown section aren't local. A robbery in a local bar at the center of town takes the town into an even worse spin. The bar owner, Babe, is a friend to Jake, but rescuing her sets off a chain of crimes increasing in challenge and severity. The bloody trail leads to a golf bag and a bag of golf balls that may not be what they seem to be.

The Genet family is caught up in the Civil War as brothers take opposing views and find themselves wearing different colored uniforms. Wesley Genet's family business in Maryland is ruined, and he moves with his parents to Kansas to start over. This story centers around Lynn Genet, Wesley's son, who resents his Indian blood and the name half-breed.

It's not just the winter murder of a young woman that has Jake Hines concerned. When the body is found at the river near a highway overpass, Jake's girlfriend Trudy is supposed to be there as a crime scene expert from the Bureau of Criminal Apprehension. Trudy is missing, the BCA is understaffed, the Rutherford Police Department needs more officers, and the snowstorm is covering up the body and evidence.

Zachariah Smith intends to find the person who shot him and Irene Sandhoff outside her office during a citizen's rally against Sandhoff. Was the bullet meant for Zach or Irene? Or, by luck, did the killer only have to use one bullet for two targets. Zach finds he must give the shooting his full attention when Phil Pauling, the chief of police for Mackie Woods, Oregon, is shot while in Zach's car, and an old friend is found dead in Zach's office.

Timber Trails is the final book in The American Blend Series. In 1781, a British soldier at Yorktown predicted to a patriot that someday their families would be united, forming their American Blend. The prediction came true in 1920 when Calvin Roberts met Lori Genet. But Calvin first had to survive the Flu epidemic of 1918, and Lori had to survive the death of her fiance, in World War I.

After escaping a lynching in Charleston for being a Redcoat during the Revolutionary War, Henry Roberts was forced to flee into Tennessee. He hoped to start anew and prayed he wouldn't be recognized as a former British soldier. To assure his safety, he becomes a fur trapper and ventures into the wilderness.

Young John Roberts thought life in Missouri exciting as he watched the border wars with Kansas turn bloody. But it was the stealing of a horse that got him in trouble. Escaping a hanging, he raced north and hid in a wagon train going west. The wagon-master intended to turn him in at the next fort, but when they were attacked by Indians, he changed his mind.

Here is the first book in the American Blend series. This series is fiction. It is based on the true exploits of two immigrant families and follows their movements through 200 years. The Genet family is from France and the Roberts family is from England. The descendants of the Genet and Roberts families grow with the country, fighting her wars, settling the land and suffering the hardships of the times.