Sean Stranahan Mysteries Series

An award-winning editor for Field Stream magazine, Keith McCafferty presents his debut novel, The Royal Wulff Murders. A local fisherman lands more than he bargained for when he pulls a dead body out of Montana's Madison River. Sheriff Martha Ettinger takes on the case and soon comes into the company of reclusive artist, Montana newcomer, and ex-PI Sean Stranahan. After teaming up to investigate, Martha and Sean soon uncover evidence that the murder has ties to one of the state's biggest industries: fly fishing.

Fourteen months after moving to Montana, fly fisherman, painter and sometime private detective Sean Stranahan is still sleeping in his office-cum-art studio, cobbling together a livelihood as a fishing guide while hawking his riverscape watercolors. No longer a newcomer, he now knows the rivers and has a new love interest in Martinique, a cat lover who earns tuition money for veterinary school by selling coffee as a bikini barista. But a life of romance and the perfectly painted horizon are not to be. A search dog has discovered the graves of two men on Sphinx Mountain. Sheriff Martha Ettinger suspects murder, but with a bear having scavenged the bodies and the only evidence a hole in a skull that might or might not have been caused by a bullet, she once more turns to Stranahan for help. He already has a case, having been hired by a group of eccentric fly fishermen called The Madison River Liars and Fly Tiers Club to find a valuable fly that they suspect stolen. Could the disappearance of a vintage Gray Ghost from a riverside cabin in the Madison Valley be connected to the gray ghosts who haunt Sphinx Mountain? Stranahan will cross paths, and arms, with some of the most powerful people in the valley to find out while enlisting the help of his friend and fellow guide, the irascible Rainbow Sam.

In the wake of Fourth of July fireworks in Montana's Madison Valley, Hyalite County sheriff Martha Ettinger and Deputy Sheriff Harold Little Feather investigate a horrific scene at the Palisades cliffs, where a herd of bison have fallen to their deaths. Victims of blind panic caused by the pyrotechnics, or a ritualistic hunting practice dating back thousands of years? The person who would know is beyond asking, an Indian man found dead among the bison, his leg pierced by an arrow. Farther up the valley, fly fisherman, painter, and sometime private detective Sean Stranahan has been hired by the beautiful Ida Evening Star, a Chippewa Cree woman who moonlights as a mermaid at the Trout Tails Bar Grill, to find her old flame, John Running Boy. The cases seem unrelated-until Sean's search leads him right to the brink of the buffalo jump. With unforgettable characters and written with his signature grace and wry humor, Buffalo Jump Blues weaves a gripping tale of murder, wildlife politics, and lost love.

A wonderful Montana mystery starring fly fisherman-cum-detective Sean Stranahan, for fans of C. J. Box and Craig Johnson Wolves howl as a riderless horse returns at sunset to the Culpepper Dude Ranch in the Madison Valley. The missing woman, Nanika Martinelli, is better known as the Fly Fishing Venus, a red-haired river guide who lures clients the way dry flies draw trout. As Sheriff Martha Ettinger follows hoof tracks in the snow, she finds one of the men who has fallen under the temptress' s spell impaled on the antler tine of a giant bull elk, a kill that' s been claimed by a wolf pack. An accident? If not, is the killer human or animal? With painter, fly fisherman, and sometimes private detective Sean Stranahan' s help, Ettinger will follow clues that point to an animal rights group called the Clan of the Three-Clawed Wolf and to their svengali master, whose eyes blaze with pagan fire.

It's April, but there's still snow on the Montana mountains the day a member of the Madison River Liar and Fly Tiers club finds a Santa hat in the chimney of his rented cabin. With the flue clogged and desperate to make a fire, he climbs up to the roof, only to find the body of a teenage girl wedged into the chimney. When Sheriff Martha Ettinger and her team arrive to extract the body they identify the victim as Cinderella "Cindy" Huntingdon, a promising young rodeo star, missing since November. Was Cindy murdered? Or running for her life-and if so, from whom? Cindy's mother, Etta, hires private detective Sean Stranahan to find out. Jasper Fey, the girl's stepfather, believes moving on is the only way to heal. But Etta's not willing to let it go, and neither are Sean or Martha, who find clues to the death in the mysterious legends of the Crazy Mountains. The fourth book in McCafferty's mystery series features a brisk, savvy plot and charming yet authentic characters-perfect for fans of C. J. Box and Craig Johnson.

The sixth novel in the acclaimed Sean Stranahan mystery series Sheriff Martha Ettinger reunites with once-again lover and sometime private detective Sean Stranahan to investigate the death of a woman who was stranded in a spring snowstorm. When a fly wallet is found in a pannier on the saddle of the woman's horse, the leather engraved with the initials EH, Stranahan shows the wallet to Patrick Willoughby, the president of the Madison River Liars and Fly Tiers Club. Only a few days before, Willoughby was approached by a man selling fishing gear that had belonged to a famous outdoorsman and writer. All the clues point to an obsession with Ernest Hemingway, and Sean soon finds himself on the trail of a missing steamer trunk rumored to contain not only the writer's valuable fly fishing gear, but perhaps even priceless samples of his unpublished work. The investigation leads Sean into the salacious world of Chinese traditional medicines, and through one extraordinary chapter in Hemingway's life to another. From a trout river in Michigan where a woman grapples with the cold in her hands and heart, to the ruins of Havana, and finally, to a cabin in Wyoming under the Froze To Death Plateau, Keith McCafferty's latest novel in the Sean Stranahan mystery series is a thrilling tale.

The seventh novel in the acclaimed Sean Stranahan mystery series: Scarecrows are appearing in the cliffs above the Smith River in Montana, and state investigator Harold Little Feather, is trying to discover the culprit leaving the hay figures in the cliffs, with signs painted that read "No Smith River Mine-Not on My Watch." The event is related to a copper mine project that threatens the river, but his investigation takes an ominous turn when a little girl claims that a scarecrow chased her in the night. At the same time, Sean Stranahan and his friend "Rainbow" Sam Meslik have been contracted as guides to float a party down the river, which includes the manager of the mine project and the president of "Save Our Smith," a grassroots organization devoted to stopping the project. Both men grew up on the Smith on neighboring ranches. When a dead body is found in the park, it's revealed that the two have a shared history that runs much deeper and darker than their opposing viewpoints.

In Montana’s Gravelly Range, paw prints and a single whisker discovered at a scene of horrific violence suggest a woman had been attacked and carried away by a mountain lion. Sheriff Martha Ettinger employs her fiancé, sometimes-detective Sean Stranahan, to put a name to the gnawed bones comprising all that is left of the body. The woman’s is the first of several deaths that Sean suspects are not as easily explained as they appear. As a reign of terror grips the Madison Valley, blood in the tracks will lead him from the river below to the snow-covered ridge tops, as Sean finds himself on his most adventurous and dangerous quest yet. For as he comes closer to unearthing the secret shared by the dead and missing, the tracks he is following will turn, and the hunter becomes the hunted.