Up Jumps the Devil: 4 (Deborah Knott Mystery)

After Margaret Marons first Deborah Knott novel Bootleggers Daughter ran away with the top mystery awards in 1993 this highly acclaimed series has continued to whet our appetite for superb fiction in which the setting is as the Houston Chronicle noted so rich in detail and description of the New South that you can almost hear the North Carolina twang and taste the barbecue. Now in her fourth outing Deborah Knott is again in the drivers seat roaring down dirt roads and checking out crime scenes until . . .UP JUMPS THE DEVIL.When truck driver and childhood neighbor Dallas Stancil is shot and killed in his own backyard Deborah figures she owes his memory at least the respectful ritual of taking his widow one of her Aunt Zells best chicken casseroles.Mistake Number One.Dallas wasnt rich but with development eating up the farms and forests of North Carolina his land is suddenly worth a fortune. His trashy chain-smoking third wife and grown stepchildren are all too aware of its value. Opportunists--including one of Deborahs own brothers--are coming out of the woodwork. And big money makes people do bad things.The Stancils have lived side-by-side with Deborahs family for several generations. When another tragedy strikes a long-hidden mistake jumps out of her past. She can run him out of town but ignoring him would be Mistake Number Two.All around the changing South Deborah sees hunting dogs rowdy funerals backwoods moonshine stills and long-bed pickups clashing with BMW-driving professionals and housing tracts. With one foot in the rural past and the other in todays high-tech present she knows her personal world is changing too. This bootleggers daughter sits on the judicial bench and sees both sides of the law. But she also feels the tug of her roots...and the pull of her heart.