Thomas Martindale, a journalism professor, is enjoying the first day of his summer vacation on the Oregon coast. He has brought with him the active curiosity and investigative abilities that often get him into situations most people would ignore. When he is invited to brunch at the home of an old friend, she confides that someone may be trying to kill her. The next night, that fear is realized when Tom finds her body at a nearby lighthouse.Tom immediately sets out to find her killer, using clues from a manuscript his friend gave him for review. Have the incidents during World War II, described in the manuscript, caused her death? Did they reveal secrets about someone--someone who feared their consequences if they were revealed? As he has in the past, Tom seeks help from his former lover, a State Police officer She has gotten him out of many tight spots in the past. But his determination to solve the murder puts him in great danger from unexpected sources--especially when he is finally confronted on a suspension bridge high above the swirling waters of Yaquina Bay.

Murder at Yaquina Head (Thomas Martindale Mystery)

Mystery, Thriller & Suspense

Lovell, Ron

Mystery

Penman Productions

In Dead Whales Tell No Tales, mystery novelist Ron Lovell returns to the locale of his first novel, Murder at Yaquina Head--the rugged Oregon Coast. It is 1987 and college professor Thomas Martindale is teaching a summer writing seminar at the university's marine center. A marine biologist dies under bizarre circumstances and his assistant, Tom's former lover, is arrested for his murder. The death occurs while a conference of the International Whaling Commission is going on at the center. In Martindale's mind, there are more likely suspects than his friend: the Japanese fisheries minister, an Eskimo whaling commissioner, and several radical environmentalists.Tom's investigation uncovers the murdered man's involvement in a drowning at sea of a graduate assistant and his collaboration with the Japanese to alter whale population statistics. It also puts him in danger from unknown pursuers who keep following him in his car. At the same time, a large Gray whale has beached herself near his house, adding a unique aura to the events on land.

Dead Whales Tell No Tales (Thomas Martindale Mystery)

Before he does anything else, amateur sleuth and college professor Thomas Martindale must get out of jail and clear his name. In the process, he has to find the real killer of a close friend and stop the fiendish plans of her former husband, a biologist trying to use human subjects in deadly virus research. His search leads him to an abandoned and spooky sanitarium in Oregon's Coast Range where he finds a murderous Mexican drug gang, an inquisitive old lady who keeps butting into his investigation, and a missing moose amid the bats, rats, cobwebs, and the horrors of past treatment schemes for the mentally ill and those with debilitating illnesses.

Descent into Madness (Thomas Martindale Mystery Series)

College professor Thomas Martindale returns to the scene of his debut as an amateur sleuth, the Yaquina Head lighthouse on Oregon's central coast, in Yaquina White. The "white" of the title stands for cocaine and that is what a murderous drug gang is importing into the state. His career in tatters because of his arrest on a bogus murder charge, Martindale must flee Oregon to escape from the leader of the gang. He joins a media tour of the Arctic only to face new dangers from Russian border guards and the crew of a ship smuggling a secret cargo over the North Pole to Pacific coast cities. After his return to Oregon, Tom has a final, deadly encounter with the drug lord at the lighthouse, from which only one of them will walk away.

Yaquina White (Thomas Martindale Mystery Series)

The world of classical music, incriminating fingerprints, and a Federal justice system gone wrong ensnare Thomas Martindale in one of the most difficult situations ever. In a story that takes the college professor/amateur sleuth from the scene of a terror attack on a coastal Oregon bridge to New York and back to a terrorist camp in Oregon's Coast Range, this novel also describes Tom's life as an author and the often hilarious world of meeting the reading public on a book tour.

Murder in E-flat Major (Thomas Martindale Mystery)

In his years as a decidedly amateur detective, Thomas Martindale has called on various professionals to get him out of the dangerous situations he often finds himself in. Only a fool would do the things he has done but his friends have saved him time and again. Two of these consummate professionals return in two novellas, Paul Bickford, the mysterious Army Special Ops officer, and Lorenzo Madrid, his longtime friend and attorney.In "Carnival," the college professor/amateur sleuth is confronted by shady carnies and a murderous clown wearing a devil's mask when a traveling road show comes to town. How hard should it be to help his old love Maxine March complete a photo assignment at the carnival? Fairly difficult when a crazed killer follows her to Oregon from her last job in Ecuador and only Bickford can help her.In "Innocent," Lorenzo is facing a crisis in his life. The long years of helping Mexican migrants deal with their lives in the U.S.--usually without pay--have taken their toll. He is burned out and ready to do something different. When guilt drives him to handle one last case--clearing the name of a young man falsely accused of murder--Lorenzo is captured by a Mexican drug gang. Before he can find out the truth, he is drawn into a web of crooked priests and ruthless drug lords and is kidnapped.

Murder Times Two: Carnival / Innocent (Thomas Martindale Mystery Series)

Although Oregon Attorney Lorenzo Madrid was at first reluctant to take care of Tito, an orphan brought to this country illegally, he grows to love the little boy. That love turns into an obligation when the woman who took the boy leaves him in Lorenzo's care. After Maxine March goes to Ecuador to arrange for a formal adoption, things take a turn for the worse. she is arrested and put on trial for kidnapping. Despite having no knowledge of trying a case overseas, Lorenzo agrees to represent her. In doing so he is torn between wanting to help her and adopting Tito as his son. In Ecuador, he is stalked by members of a drug cartel who has been after him for years. The story culminates in a trial and daring escape. As in other mysteries, author Ron Lovell brings back memorable characters from past books--Paul Bickford and Bobbi Bouquet--out of both the Madrid sereis and his earlier Thomas Martindale series.

Dangerous Decisiones (Lorenzo Madrid Mystery)

The high stakes game of university recruiting and a scandal involving athletes form the centerpiece of Ron Lovell's new Thomas Martindale mystery, "Lights, Camera, MURDER." Martindale is acting as the liaison between the university and a video production company to prepare a series of television advertisements to attract new students. When one of his young students is murdered, Martindale goes on the trail of her killer. Along the way, he uncovers a scandal involving the recruitment of black football players. He also encounters the wife of a coach who will stop at nothing to get young men into her bed and keep her exploits secret. More campus-oriented than the two previous novels in the Martindale series, "Murder at Yaquina Head" and "Dead Whales Tell No Tales," "Lights, Camera, MURDER" also skewers the committee system that dominates most universities and reveals the amusing--and often tedious--day-to-day world of the classroom. As always, Martindale's search for the killer puts him in danger in some unlikely places: the steam tunnels running under campus, an isolated covered bridge, and the high cliffs behind an isolated inn above the churning Pacific Ocean.

Lights, Camera, MURDER: A Thomas Martindale Mystery, Book 3 (Thomas Martindale Mysteries)

Literature & Fiction

Genre Fiction

Thomas Martindale, a journalism professor, is enjoying the first day of his summer vacation on the Oregon coast. He has brought with him the active curiosity and investigative abilities that often get him into situations most people would ignore. When he is invited to brunch at the home of an old friend, she confides that someone may be trying to kill her. The next night, that fear is realized when Tom finds her body at a nearby lighthouse. Tom immediately sets out to find her killer, using clues from a manuscript his friend gave him for review. Have the incidents during World War II, described in the manuscript, caused her death? Did they reveal secrets about someone--someone who feared their consequences if they were revealed? As he has in the past, Tom seeks help from his former lover, a State Police officer She has gotten him out of many tight spots in the past. But his determination to solve the murder puts him in great danger from unexpected sources--especially when he is finally confronted on a suspension bridge high above the swirling waters of Yaquina Bay.

Murder at Yaquina Head (Thomas Martindale Mysteries)

College professor, and amateur sleuth, Thomas Martindale is teaching a summer writing workshop at the Marine Science Center in the small town of Newport, Oregon. During the conference of the International Whaling Commission, a marine biologist is found dead on the beach in a disturbing place.When Martindale's former assistant is arrested for the murder, he must wade through the sea of growing suspects to save her. As he uncovers the dead man's sketchy past, a vast ocean of lies and deceit rise from the deep.Action-packed small town mystery that will keep you guessing until the whales sing.

Dead Whales Tell No Tales: A Thomas Martindale Mystery, Book 2 (Thomas Martindale Mysteries)

Literary

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