Second Sentence Press: 15 books

None of them have an alibi. All of them had a reason to pull the trigger. Major Cambert and his grandson Jim had quarreled bitterly over Jim’s choice of a wife, so when the Major is found shot dead by his own fireside a few nights later, Jim is the prime suspect—and a suspect without an...

Mrs. Meade feels that the facts don't add up. But why won't the accused defend himself? Mrs. Meade isn't the only one in Sour Springs who is shocked at the news when Clyde Renfrew is accused of a drunken assault on a woman. Clyde, a sober, steady young rancher, seemed the last person likely...

A girl has disappeared...but did she go of her own accord? In turn-of-the-century Colorado, in the little town of Sour Springs, a young woman has disappeared from the boarding-house where she lives. Her distraught fiancé believes she must have been kidnapped. The case takes a new turn...

On a snowy December evening during the Great Depression, a high-spirited college student impulsively decides to do some spying on a quiet classmate—with unexpected results. A short story both funny and touching, in which mischief brings about a small Christmas miracle. Some Christmas Camouflage is a short story, approximately 9,400 words long.

She needed a husband on short notice to save the ranch. They needed a ring to make it official, and his best pal just happened to have a real nice one handy. And they’re all about to get way more than they bargained for. Meredith Fayett needed to marry someone before the week...

Meet Mrs. Meade, who has a knack for being just across the hall when something puzzling happens... A girl has disappeared from her boarding-house, and both her fiancé and a city detective are anxious to find her—for very different reasons. A respectable young man is accused of assaulting...

Practicing his quick draw seemed a harmless amusement...until the day a boys' quarrel exploded into gunplay. Sixteen-year-old Lew Kelly grew up idolizing his enigmatic ex-gunfighter father. But his notion of following in his father's footsteps only led to disaster. Three years later,...

This Red Riding Hood is willing to walk into the wolf’s den. But will she find what she is seeking? In the shadow of the mountain, Rosa Jean Kennedy lives alone, waiting. Vengeance for her brother’s death is the only object left in her life, the one thing that steels her resolve...

At the bottom of an old trinket-box lies a misshapen bit of lead—a bullet from the Civil War, an old family keepsake preserved, but mostly forgotten, by later generations. And behind it lies a story—the story of a young girl's experiences in the days surrounding the fateful battle of Gettysburg,...

There's no fairy godmothers on the prairie. It doesn't take a magic spell to dance into danger in the Jazz Age. And there's more than one kind of wolf waiting at the end of this mountail trail. Corral Nocturne: Life on her brother’s ranch is lonely for Ellie Strickland. Ed’s...

The Twelve Dancing Princesses meets the heady glamor and danger of the Jazz Age All Dorothy Perkins wants is to have a good time. She’s wild about dancing, and can’t understand or accept her father’s strictness in forbidding it. Night after night she sneaks out to the Lost Lake House,...

A collection of Western short stories that go beyond the standard action and adventure of the genre to focus on character and conflict. In the award-winning "Disturbing the Peace," honorable mention in the 2010 Rope and Wire short story competition, a sheriff experiences a revelation about himself...

The fire wasn't an accident. Mrs. Meade hopes it wasn't what the sheriff thinks it is. It was supposed to be a pleasant visit with old friends. But it turns to terror when a fire destroys the Lansburys' house during the night, and one of their guests is killed. Even worse, the fire appears...

There's no fairy godmothers on the prairie. But there just might be a prince. Life on her brother’s ranch is lonely for Ellie Strickland. Ed’s ungracious manners and tight-fisted habits keep visitors away and his mother and sister close to home. But when Cole Newcomb, son of the...