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05/2006. vii, 248 pages.
089672574X
978-0-89672-574-4

Quarry

By Susan Cummins Miller

"Wonderful . . . Frankie suspects that a serial killer may be on the loose, a man who is so good at assuming new identities that he almost resembles the shape-changers of Native American myth. When Frankie is asked to join a geological expedition into the Mojave desert, she jumps at the chance to get away from the mayhem, but trouble follows her, with near-fatal results."—Mystery Scene

"Try getting your doctorate—in geology, no less—as your friends and colleagues are being attacked and murdered. Try finding out that your ex-fiance has been plagiarizing your work, and then discover that he's disappeared and might be dead. And then you still have to be able to tell creosote from andesite and basalt. . . . An engaging read."—Tucson Weekly

"The story opens with Frankie still preparing for the defense of her doctoral dissertation. But MacFarlane has more problems than that. It appears her manipulative ex-boyfriend is not dead but threateningly alive. And then her major professor is the victim of a mailbox bomb, possibly intended for MacFarlane. And that is just the beginning of the mayhem."—Arizona Daily Star

As geologist Frankie MacFarlane prepares for her doctoral dissertation defense, two members of her committee are brutally attacked, one of them fatally. Meanwhile, the case on the supposedly deceased Geoff Travers is reopened, forcing Frankie to deal with the possibility that her former fiancé might still be alive. And, while working on a vertebrate fossil quarry, fellow student Dora Simpson is abducted. For her, time is running out.

In the Mojave Desert, amid the arroyos and volcanic mesas of the Cady Mountains, Frankie finds the final pieces to these puzzles—and becomes the quarry.

“Fast-paced, yet lyrical and evocative, Quarry yields a cross-section of creatures as fascinating as the fossil beds its protagonist studies. The real mystery for Frankie MacFarlane fans is how to read this book slowly enough to savor Susan Cummins Miller’s skillful prose and characterization.”—Wynne Brown, author of More Than Petticoats: Remarkable Arizona Women

Susan Cummins Miller worked as a field geologist with the U.S. Geological Survey and taught geology and oceanography before becoming a writer of fiction, nonfiction, and poetry. She lives in Tucson, Arizona.

Praise for previous Frankie MacFarlane Mysteries:
“A rollicking pentimento of fieldwork gone afoul!”—Geotimes
“Assured and erudite.”—Publishers Weekly
“A gripping thriller, exciting and eager to lure the reader into a labyrinth of human deceit. . . . Attention Hollywood—this is the stuff from which blockbuster movies can be made!”—Midwest Book Review