When Memory Fails: A Harry Bronson Mystery/Thriller

In the prologue to Hayden’s gripping seventh novel featuring retired Dallas police detective Harry Bronson (after What Lies Beyond the Fence), the dying Isaac Sechrest, sometime in the early 1900s, tells his teenage granddaughter, Victoria, that the family fortune was “built on deceit, lies, and corruption.” He asks Victoria to find a way to return the money and property he stole to their rightful owners, and gives her a secret ledger that documents his crimes for safekeeping. In present-day Colorado, Harry wakes up, badly hurt, with no memory of who he is or how he was injured. Meanwhile, 19-year-old Sandy Sechrest, a descendant of Isaac’s, and her 20-year-old boyfriend, Daniel Jenkins, who’s Harry’s nephew, are held at gunpoint by Pablo Lazzarone, who boasts of having just killed Harry and threatens to hurt them if they don’t help him find the ledger. Flashbacks reveal how Harry and Sandy ended up in their current predicaments. Plot twists, including searing betrayals, add emotional heft to the fast-paced plot. Fans of offbeat suspense novels will be gratified. (Self-published)