The Sheriff of Jefferson County by JT Hume
01 - Monday Dawn This is when Maggie loved Nevada the most, the dawn about to awaken the sagebrush land spread below her. The sun had not yet peaked over the far range, the eagles and hawks were somnolent in their nests, and the air was crisp and still as it settled into her bones. She resisted the urge to rub her frozen legs with her free hand, choosing the safety of non-movement over warmth. Max whined a little at her side and she dropped her hand to his ear, ruffling the fur. “Almost, Mutt. Almost. Another minute or two.” She sensed rather than saw him settle himself onto his front paws, showing his usual infinite patience. She adjusted the rifle scope and looked down the mountain. She’s chosen this spot well, giving her straight-in view of the camp at the base. Two tents, a double and a single, on each side of the fire trailing a thin line of white smoke into the air. Two Jeep Cherokees parked nearby, one worn to the bone with the original color lost under layers of mud and dirt, and the other shiny and unscratched, probably driven off the car lot last week, she guessed. Two visitors and a local, their guide, she decided. Aside from their presence on federal land, the campfire is what aggravated her the most. These hills hadn’t seen rain in months, and normally she’d be sitting in a few inches of snow at this altitude in November. The Sierra Nevada mountains and its foothills to the west did an excellent job of acting as rain shadows for the inner part of the state, but Maggie was a lifelong Nevadan and she couldn’t remember the last serious rain or snow to hit these parts. One spark and a bad wind would wipe out homes for ten square miles in an instant.
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The Sheriff of Jefferson County by JT Hume
A second look and she sighed. There was a bighorn sheep roped on the hood of the new Cherokee, its tongue out of its mouth and pointing to the ground. The sun rose and peaked almost straight into her scope, causing her to blink and lose sight of the camp. No bother, she thought. Her informant was right, as always, and that reliability had her at the sitting below the summit of a mountain that probably had no name after a three-mile hike through the brush in the dark, risking a twisted ankle or worse. Humans were not the only danger to bighorns in these parts. The cougar paw print a few yards back was days old, she judged, but no worries. She had the best mountain lion detector in the world sitting next to her. She ruffled Max’s ears again. “Okay, we’re done. Back slowly and quiet, okay.” Max popped up and trotted away with Maggie in his wake, a little slower. Her bad knee was growling again, like it always did when it got cold, and she cursed herself for not taking Advil or something before hitting the road. The good news was her mended collarbone was barking a little, too, a sign of an approaching low front. Rain, please, she prayed. The hike back to her wheels was faster than leaving it, the sun being a friend for the moment. Most often it was her adversary, along with the heat it brought. Maggie wasn’t quite yet thirty, but the hours spent outside in zero humidity prematurely aged her skin. She wasn’t so vain to worry about the lines around her eyes, but knew Poppo could see them and would worry. She smirked a little. Poppo worried about everything. She traveled light, as was her habit through life. Having spent decades hiking through tall sagebrush, Maggie learned along the way to wear boots with laces, pants with tight cuffs, flexible leather gloves, and a coat that fell to her hips. Her toolbelt, as
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The Sheriff of Jefferson County by JT Hume
she called it, was locked in her Jeep now, her Glock in a case under her seat, also locked. She muttered a curse at her cowboy hat, one of the two required symbols of office. The new one she wore didn’t sit right, no matter what she did or how she arranged her thick auburn hair, and the damn thing fell off every time she jumped across a dry gutter. Given a choice, she’d give it to Max to tear it to pieces, but she had to wear one to remind people who she was and what she represented. In less time than she would have guessed, Maggie and Max crested one last small hill and found her Jeep where she left it. Like the older version at the base of the mountain, her official wheels were caked with mud, though this dirt came from a call weeks in the past. She wiped the debris from the door, revealing the star underneath, before she unlocked the Jeep. She tossed her gear over to the passenger seat and donned her toolbelt, then retrieved her Glock from under the seat, taking a second to make sure there was a round in the chamber. After a few seconds of contemplation, she donned a second holster, this one for the Taser, following by pinning the second symbol of office to her chest over her heart. She ran down the list of gear on her body and in the Jeep, satisfied with the outcome, before climbing in the driver’s seat and starting the engine. She smiled to herself as she always did when she dropped the Jeep into gear. Speaking to no one in particular, she whispered, “Sheriff Maggie Doane of Jefferson County, Nevada, is on the clock.”
02 - Jefferson County, Nevada
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The Sheriff of Jefferson County by JT Hume
Around the year 2018, the federal government found it was losing the Sagebrush Rebellion, a small but important protest by Nevada ranchers seeking to graze cattle on restricted federal land. The ranchers had what some called a reasonable argument: they’d been on the land for generations, their cattle needed access to the water and desert grub, and they felt the land belonged to the people. The government, being the government, tried to meet them halfway by charging minimal access fees. The ranchers refused to pay. The government sued, the ranchers sued back, and the Rebellion was on. Decades later, some of the ranchers and their followers took armed possession of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in Oregon in protest. Harsh words were exchanged and the standoff lasted for weeks, ending after a shoot-out in which one of the principal leaders was killed and many protesters arrested. While they may have lost that battle, they won the war when a federal jury found them innocent of all crimes, including the important charge of obstructing federal officers. Malheur Refuge was the first domino to fall as subsequent trials, criminal and civil, were most often found in favor of ranchers and their fellow interlopers. It wasn’t because the federal prosecutors had ironclad cases, because they did under the letter of the law, but they continued to lose because the juries had more respect for local governance. Voters echoed this respect by electing politicians with similar views, including the ones sent to Washington, notably the one who sat in the Oval Office. Enter an unimportant civil servant in his cubicle in the Bureau of Land Management headquarters on C Street NW in Washington DC. The BLM was the de facto owner of most of the federal land in Nevada, save for the hundreds of acres set
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The Sheriff of Jefferson County by JT Hume
aside for the military. The bureau was the sworn enemy of the Sagebrush Rebellion, and its offices were smeared with graffiti, employees followed and threatened, and its budget slashed by powerful Western congressmen whenever possible. To say that some in the BLM operated with a bunker mentality was not far from the truth. On this day in the year 2018, the unnamed civil servant developed a plan to remove the teeth from the so-called Sagebrush Rebellion, and the plan was brilliant in its simplicity, though complex in execution. If the BLM couldn’t win in court against their united foe, he planned to break them up and set the ranchers against each other. Creating new laws governing the lands was next to impossible, thanks to an implacable Congress. What they could do is find new ways to interject money into one of the poorest states in the Union. He drummed his fingers as he looked at the map on the wall, and his eyes caught a legend in the lower corner. Nevada had seventeen counties, some larger than East Coast states. A smile crossed his features. If the federal government could incentivize Nevada to break up the counties into smaller pieces, the ranchers would divert their energies to grabbing as big a piece of the pie as they could grab. The resulting animosity would damage the Rebellion, maybe destroy it. The BLM needed a cover reason, and the large blue swathes on the map provided the means: national security. Much of the federal land in Nevada, but not nearly most, was set aside for classified activities, including the famous Area 51. If the federal government offered “development grants” in the millions of dollars, plus an agreement to transfer some unimportant federal land to local control, in exchange for
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The Sheriff of Jefferson County by JT Hume
smaller municipal government bodies, the Nevadans would gladly chop their large counties to tiny bits. The BLM leaders in the building expressed skepticism. They doubted both the effectiveness and the assumed depth of Western nativity, but they had nothing to lose other than their jobs. This was not an invalid concern: the front door to the BLM headquarters might as well have been on a turnstile, considering the number of lost court cases under the previous administration’s watch. The current one had no problem firing scores of workers for flimsy reasons. Their logic was that when the government failed as it always did, someone had to pay the price, and civil servants are a dime a dozen. The Department of Justice loved the idea, and knew from their sad experience in the courtrooms who could be approached in the private sector. The idea caught fire, especially with the elected ones as a means to appear to be doing hard work. The Nevada State Legislature was suspicious and decided to meet the Feds halfway. The BLM wanted thirty counties. The Legislature authorized twenty, out of the original seventeen. Jefferson County was the first, made up from parts of Nye, White Pine, and Lincoln counties. Reno to the northwest and Las Vegas to the south have a police force, and all Nevada counties have an elected sheriff. Maggie Doane was the second elected sheriff of Jefferson County. Her father was the first. Her grandfather was a past sheriff of Clark County, home of Las Vegas.
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The Sheriff of Jefferson County by JT Hume
During this week in question, Sheriff Doane the younger almost ended her tenure in office in the same way as her grandfather: his name etched in concrete next to his badge on a Clark County memorial wall.
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The Sheriff of Jefferson County by JT Hume
03 - Monday Morning Maggie paid scant attention to the dirt road down the mountain, it barely qualifying as a “road.” She debated calling in her position and status, knowing no one was manning the board back in the office. The town drunk, Tom Wilkens, was most likely sleeping off yet another weekend in one of the unlocked holding cells downstairs, ironically making him the most reliable presence in the Jefferson County combined sheriff’s office and courthouse. Three of her four deputies were all family men, and rolled into the office on their schedule, leaving Maggie with the midnight to noon shift. Idly she wondered if anyone applied for the undersheriff position, open since Joel Cunningham retired months earlier. Unlike the rest of the force, she was happy to see him leave. Joel was old school law enforcement, believing women had no place wearing a badge. The fact that the voters picked Maggie over him as sheriff drove him to early retirement. The remaining deputies worshiped Joel, including Joel’s son Tanner, one of her deputies. Maggie would be dealing with Joel’s shadow for years to come. She needed an undersheriff, too, bad. She was the sole administrator and office supervisor, and twenty-hour days were becoming more common than not. Depending on whatever crisis was exploding around her, there were days at a stretch where Maggie catnapped on the couch in her office. It would be nice to have someone in the number two job that she trusted, and who could carry the load while not pissing off the locals. None of the four deputies came close to either the trust factor or the not-pissingoff thing, though none of them agreed with her. Knowing it was a waste of time, she keyed her microphone. “Delta One, checking in.”
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The Sheriff of Jefferson County by JT Hume
Silence, as expected, and she sighed. A real sheriff’s office would have the radio desk covered around the clock, but Jefferson County was the poorest of Nevada’s twenty counties, which was saying something, Nevada basically being a third world economic power surrounded by the first world. The county had little to none financial resources for the little things like a full-time law enforcement office. The building’s phones were routed to Ely to the northeast for emergencies after office hours, but that situation was personally and professionally intolerable to her. It was why she was often the sole LEO vehicle roaming the county at three in the morning. Maggie clicked over to the main NHP band. “Delta One.” The response was instantaneous. “Delta One, go.” She fought down the pangs of envy she felt whenever she radioed the Nevada Highway Patrol. The NHP had jurisdiction over the state’s highways, and their troopers bent over backwards to help “the small-town county mounties,” as she heard one of them say when he thought she wasn’t listening. They had the funding and training she craved for her own department, something that would remain forever a distant dream. “I’m checking on a campsite for possible poachers. No need for back-up. Just letting someone know where I am.” “Roger, Delta One. Golf Papa?” “Right.” She pushed a button on her set. “GPS is running.” “Stand by.” A pause. “Got your signal. You’re way up there, Sheriff. Triple Nickel is closest at thirty out. He’s clear and can be there ASAP. Advise.” Maggie cringed a little. Nevada Highway Patrol troopers were identified by their badge number, and NHP Badge 555 was Sergeant Josh Phelps out of Ely. Josh was
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The Sheriff of Jefferson County by JT Hume
also Maggie’s uncle, her mother’s brother, and he’d be a little upset if something happened to her if she didn’t want his help, to say the least. Even so, she pushed back. You don’t become the senior law enforcement official in the area by calling for help whenever you needed your back scratched, she reasoned. “Thank you, Dispatch. I got this. Delta One out.” “Dispatch out.” The sudden silence set in on Maggie, this time more than others. She was used to being alone, between her patrol time and desk time, but that was different than being lonely. She rarely had the time to be lonely. She barely had time to eat and sleep, for that matter. The reality was she spent more time with Max, her mutt, than any other living creature, Poppo included. Sensitive to her mood, Max lifted his head in his place in the passenger seat, whining a little. Maggie laughed and playfully grabbed his jaw, giving it a little shake. “You ready to catch some guys, you old fart?” The mongrel grinned like dogs seem to do and licked her hand. There was no need to sneak up on the site, especially in the dead silence of the dawn. If the campers were awake, they’d hear her a mile out. She clicked on her dash camera, being one of the few senior law officers in Nevada to wholeheartedly embrace this technology. The footage saved her bacon from a dozen lawsuits. Maggie had a reputation for settling most arguments with undue force. Her rep was not entirely unfounded. Listening to her grandfather and father about patrolling in the wild west that was old Nevada, she learned that bad guys will resort to all means to escape apprehension, including breaking police officers into tiny pieces. A
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The Sheriff of Jefferson County by JT Hume
younger Maggie scoffed at these tales as macho bravado, and her rebuilt knee and mended collarbone paid the price. Today, bad guys and gals didn’t get a second chance. She parked her Jeep besides the other, her heart sinking as she recognized the dirty SUV. A simple poaching situation was now fifty times more complicated. No matter, she mumbled. The law is the law, unknowingly echoing her father. Maggie rolled down the passenger window and Max leaped out, and she opened her own door. When her boots hit the dirt, the zipper on the larger tent went up and two men crawled out, wearing camouflage jackets and pants favored by weekend warriors with paint guns. Both looked like they spent too much time in front of a computer and not enough time outside, judging by their pasty white skin. Their hands were empty. The taller of the two wore glasses and squinted a little in the morning sun. “Morning, officer. Something we can do?” Friendly but guarded, Maggie judged. He knew they were in trouble and would get their hands slapped. “Sheriff Doane,” she said as she pointed to the newer SUV. “Want to tell me about this bighorn?” The smaller guy edged a little behind his buddy, his hands in his coat pockets. “Found him.” Maggie dropped her hand to her sidearm. “Sir, do me a favor and take your hands out of your pockets. Now.” He complied, his expression sheepish. “Sorry, I know better.” She nodded and raised her voice towards the second tent. “Dex, come on out where we can see you.”
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In response, the second Jeep behind her turned over its engine, dropped into gear, and accelerated. Straight at her. No time to pull out her weapon, Maggie rolled away as the SUV went straight through the air where she was standing a heartbeat ago. It drove over the second small tent and was gone from sight down the hill by the time she got to her knees with her Glock pointed at the men by the tent. “On the ground. Now!” Their hands shot into the air and the taller stammered his words. “Ma’am, we had nothing to do with that.” Max appeared from the brush to their right, growling. In another situation, their reaction would be comical. They dropped down like their puppet strings were cut, their faces bouncing in the dirt. As she approached, deciding cuffs weren’t necessary, the sound of a powerful car engine froze her in place. Dex was stupid, but not so stupid to come back, she decided, so that means it could be only one person. A blue Ford Interceptor pulled up beside Maggie’s Jeep and a mountain of a man stepped out. Easily six foot seven, he wore a tailored uniform, a bright silver badge, and a buzzcut that was so short, she knew she could only see his grey hairs if she sat a foot away from him. His voice was deep. “Sheriff Doane.” “Sergeant Phelps.”
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The Sheriff of Jefferson County by JT Hume
“Happened to be in the neighborhood.” His eyes flickered at the men on the ground. “Need a hand?” She holstered her sidearm. “I got this. You didn’t happen to see Dexter Davis leaving the area?” The NHP trooper’s face flushed red. “Dexter again?” “Pretty sure.” “That would have been his dust cloud on the other side of the gully, then? No chance of me cutting him off from that direction.” “No worries. I’ll kick over a few rocks.” She turned back to the men on the ground. “Stand up, you idiots.” They stood, brushing the dirt from their clothes. “I got some good news for you. You have a chance to make a lot of this go away. Not all of it, but a lot of it. Interested?” They looked at each other and shrugged. “Sure,” replied the taller one. “Good. Let me spell this out for you. Nevada Revised Statute 503.090 makes it illegal for you to poach our state animal out of season, but that’s a soft felony. You’re going to get fined and your hand slapped, if you don’t have anything prior arrests and convictions on your record. Do you?” They shook their heads hard. “Good. Using a vehicle to assault a law officer in the performance of her duties is hard time. Serious hard time. You are complicit in that crime, and our friendly neighborhood judge, Hanging Harry, would have no problem sending you away for a few years.” “We didn’t -” He stopped when Maggie raised her hand. “The Judge don’t care. He’ll watch my dashcam and see your faces. You want to take that chance?” They shook their heads.
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The Sheriff of Jefferson County by JT Hume
“Okay, this is what’s going to happen. After I take some pictures, you two will put the bighorn in the back of my Jeep. You will drive to the courthouse in Davis and turn yourselves into one of my deputies for booking. You give full statements as to what happened here, and you promise to show up for the hearing, and I’ll get the magistrate to release you on your own recognizance.” The shorter man spoke. “But you said…” Maggie cut him off. “This is not a negotiation. This is a decision. Your decision. You can spend the rest of the week in my holding cell and a few years in a Carson City medium security prison, or do you want to do what I said and sleep in your beds tonight?” He started to speak, but was interrupted by the taller man. “We’ll take your deal.” “Good. Drivers licenses. Give them to me.” They pulled out their wallets and handed over the licenses, warily watching Max. He growled as they approached Maggie, reminding them that he was still a force to be reckoned. “Stand by the hood of your car.” She took a few pictures with a small digital camera from her belt. The men continued to fidget, but stood silently until Maggie gestured at them to lift the dead animal and put it in the back of her Jeep. She and Sergeant Phelps covered their mouths as the men wrestled with the large corpse. A third and fourth set of hands would help, but neither law officer felt the need or enough pity for them. A few minutes later, the hunters were gone, having thrown their gear in their Jeep without folding.
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Sergeant Phelps cocked an eyebrow at Maggie. “You think they’re going to the courthouse?” “Oh, yeah. No balls to do otherwise.” “Yeah. What are you going to do with the bighorn?” “Shame to waste it.” “You’re not calling Butch Wilkens at Wildlife?” The Nevada Department of Wildlife had jurisdiction over wildlife offenses and Butch was the local senior ranger. “I’ll get around to it.” They shared a smile, knowing she’d do no such thing. “Tell Poppo to save me a sandwich.” “Friday?” “Sure.” “Bring Sara and the rugrats. We don’t see them enough.” He snorted. “Like you’ll be there.” She knew he said it as a joke, but it still stung a little. “Hit the road, Sergeant.” He turned and waved over his shoulder as he got into his Interceptor. “Be careful out there, Sheriff.” Maggie waited until he left to reply. “I always am.”
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The Sheriff of Jefferson County by JT Hume
04 - Monday Race Maggie paused at the campfire, kicking the cold embers and smelling for smoke. Satisfied it was out, she whistled at Max who leapt through the open passenger window. She saw him drooling and looking in back as she climbed in. “Okay, old dog, keep your tongue in your mouth. We’ll go to the ranch first and drop off our new friend, but you ain’t getting nothing until Poppo and Miguel are done.” Satisfied with her response, Max dropped his head on the seat and started snoring. Maggie settled back and let her mind drift, trying to remember the last time she was out at the ranch. No matter. She could predict Poppo’s words, having heard them a hundred times since she was elected. There would be the subtle guilt trip about taking time off from work, the not-so-subtle guilt trip about the lack of grandchildren, and the blatant observations about her health, and how she wasn’t taking care of herself. Poppo spent most of his adult life as a White Pine County deputy, never aspiring to office, and happy to raise his daughter on their ranch well off the beaten path. When elections were set up for Jefferson County, he threw his hat in the ring as a joke, never guessing his opponent would be arrested by the FBI for accepting bribes for various crimes and offenses under the color of office. Poppo served four terms before retiring to the ranch. Maggie was one of his deputies, though neither planned it that way. She hoped to leave the state after graduating high school, but economic realities sent her to Reno to attend The University of Nevada. Considering she came from a family of cops, earning a criminal justice degree was easier than falling off a log. She spent three years with the Washoe County Sheriff’s Office, focusing on the law enforcement to the north
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of Pyramid Lake and around tribe land. In the back of her mind, she was always filling out an application for the FBI or maybe something with the State Department overseas, but nothing long term in Nevada, that was for sure. Her plans disappeared in a puff a smoke when the doctors found a nodule on her father’s chest x-ray. She raced home, despite his angry commands otherwise, and made sure he took his meds and made the needed trips to Salt Lake City and Las Vegas for treatment. When her savings and checking accounts ran low, it was only logical that she join the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office. Her first run-in with Undersheriff and Acting Sheriff Joel Cunningham was not pleasant. He made it clear that Maggie was on probationary status despite her years on the street and her degree, and that she likely would be out of a job when her father came back to work due to state and local laws concerning families working together. Until that time, she would work the night to morning shift, and be the on-call deputy whenever needed. Maggie tolerated a year of this abuse, spending more time than she liked sleeping at hospitals between shifts while her father took chemo. The best day of her life came when the doctors told them Poppo’s cancer was in full remission. The damage to his body was the price for survival. He would never roll on another call. But Poppo was stubborn and stayed on the job until the voters elected his successor. Undersheriff Cunningham was certain he’d win in a landslide, but didn’t account for the last-minute filing for office by Deputy Doane. She easily beat Cunningham in the general election and took her father’s place a few weeks later.
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Maggie didn’t know which surprised her more: that fact that she ran for sheriff or that she won. Cunningham’s promise to kick her out the door didn’t faze her because she hadn’t planned to stay. She was still dreaming of travel and serving in faraway lands until she found herself on top of a mountain at dawn, not unlike the one she would be months later, overlooking the poachers. The sun came up and, for the first time, she looked at Nevada, really looked. Between the open sky and the vast lands before her, she understood that the Silver State was in her blood, and that its people, headstrong and courageous, needed her to be there for them. She filed for office the same day. The election wasn’t even close, and she still wasn’t sure if her victory was more from the locals’ antipathy towards Cunningham’s heavy hand, her father cajoling the voters, or that she would be the only female sheriff in Nevada’s twenty counties. In any case, Maggie wore the sheriff’s badge and Cunningham didn’t. He retired shortly after the district judge swore her into office. That should have been the end of her personnel problems, but it was the beginning, starting with the four remaining deputies. None were pleased that the office outcast was their boss, and they displayed this through lax work habits and “flexible” work schedules. Maggie wished she could fire them all, or at least smack them upside the head, but replacing them would be nearly impossible. No one was in a rush to work in a small county police force. Fifty percent of their effort was superior to zero percent. Her work schedule, for good or bad, helped her avoid most the local politics that came with the job. The county commission was more concerned with making laws to keep the ranchers and miners happy, all the while finding a way to fund the schools and local infrastructure. She couldn’t avoid the county manager, Bill King, who pretended to
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be her boss (though she really answered only to the voters, in fact). He was always looking for ways to cut costs. If not for federal grants written and submitted by her father, her department would be riding horses. She ignored King’s emails and phone calls when she could. Bill generally left her alone lately, possibly because she dragged her feet on hiring both an undersheriff and her own replacement as deputy. If she knew King, she bet he was spending hours figuring out how to spend the salary savings. Maggie got off the dirt road and onto the highway. Another thirty minutes of driving would get her to the ranch, she calculated, plus thirty minutes to unload the bighorn and gossip with Poppo. Then she could spend a few hours looking for Dex Davis and kick his ass for trying to run her down, or arrest him, then kick his ass. She was snapped out of her reverie when a red sports car passed her on the right, going like a bat out of hell. It became a dot on the road in a second, it seemed. Crap, she whispered, as she clicked on the Jeep’s rollers and floored the gas pedal, knowing full well that the car ahead outclassed her poor old SUV. Her hope was to get a plate number, at the very least, before it disappeared over the horizon. She didn’t bother with the radio. Sergeant Phelps took off in the opposite direction and she was the only law officer on this strip of road. In a world of hurt, speeding wasn’t even close to the worst offence in her mind. She’d seen too much pain and trouble to be concerned about one hot rod, though Bill King would enjoy the revenue from the speeding ticket if she caught him. That was a big “if.”
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Maggie felt her jaw slacken when she crested a hill and found the car parked on the side of the road, then her face flush red when she recognized the driver leaning on the trunk. She pulled up behind him and tromped out of the Jeep, planning to pin his ears back. Her plans went out the window when he took her face in his hands and gave her a slow kiss.
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The Sheriff of Jefferson County by JT Hume
This serial and book are solely owned by its creator, JT Hume (a pseudonym). Copyright © 2016 and © 2017. All rights reserved in all countries and languages. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the author, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. Third-party vendors providing electronic means to create, edit, and/or publish/post this serial and book have no literary and/or financial claim (including wi-fi network owners and operators). For more information and permission requests, the author may be contacted via email only: jthumebooks at gmail dot com. Twitter: @JT_Hume Website: http://www.jthumebooks.com
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