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Al Quinn Mysteries: Collection #1
Al Quinn Books 1 – 3
To Hell and Gone in Texas
Retired sheriff’s detective Al Quinn hasn’t spoken to his brother, Maury, in twenty years. When Maury lands in the hospital under suspicious circumstances, though, Al reluctantly abandons his quiet country seclusion to look into the matter. A second attempt to take Maury out drives the brothers back to Al’s lakeside home, where Al knows the territory, but they’re not alone for long. ICE agents demand that Maury rat on his silent partner, city cop Fergie Jergens comes investigating the murders of Maury’s lady friends, and someone takes a match to Al’s house. Al soon learns his problems are only getting started—his brother’s in trouble on both sides of the U.S.-Mexico border. Caught in a ruthless power struggle between the ICE and Los Zetas, a vicious Mexican mafia bent on ascendancy, Al learns the hard way who he can trust—and who’s willing to do whatever it takes to succeed. With everything he loves on the line, Al will find out just how far he’ll go to protect his own.
A Turtle Roars in Texas
Detective Al Quinn had hoped to spend his retirement fishing at his lakeside home and taking care of the local deer. That bubble pops when Gladys Sanders, the sixty-year-old co-owner of an organic farm, is found dead by her two sisters, her body displayed like a scarecrow. On the same day, her son is run over in his kayak. Evidence slips away from the scene right under the noses of two deputies, so Sheriff Clayton asks Al to mentor a younger detective. That simple task explodes into raw danger when three rival biker gangs with ties to Mexican cartels start mixing it up in earnest. ICE Agent Jaime Avila tells Al that old turtles ought to leave the fighting to the young. But when the danger involves Al’s brother, Al dives into the heart of the ruckus. Before the war is over, the gangs just might get to hear the turtle roar.
Throw the Texas Dog a Bone
Human bones found in a furnace at an animal shelter just outside of Austin cause retired detective Al Quinn to be called in to work the case. Before he leaves the shelter, Al adopts a new companion, Tanner, a dog just two days away from being euthanized. Testing shows that the bones belong to more than one person. Al must deal with a pesky FBI human-trafficking team that butts into the investigation while he is training a new detective. At home, he has a houseful of people when he’d planned to live alone, not to mention his new pet. Add a burglary ring whose members threaten his housemates, along with Tanner, and someone will soon be seeing the dark side of Al Quinn.
To Hell and Gone in Texas
Retired sheriff’s detective Al Quinn hasn’t spoken to his brother, Maury, in twenty years. When Maury lands in the hospital under suspicious circumstances, though, Al reluctantly abandons his quiet country seclusion to look into the matter. A second attempt to take Maury out drives the brothers back to Al’s lakeside home, where Al knows the territory, but they’re not alone for long. ICE agents demand that Maury rat on his silent partner, city cop Fergie Jergens comes investigating the murders of Maury’s lady friends, and someone takes a match to Al’s house. Al soon learns his problems are only getting started—his brother’s in trouble on both sides of the U.S.-Mexico border. Caught in a ruthless power struggle between the ICE and Los Zetas, a vicious Mexican mafia bent on ascendancy, Al learns the hard way who he can trust—and who’s willing to do whatever it takes to succeed. With everything he loves on the line, Al will find out just how far he’ll go to protect his own.
A Turtle Roars in Texas
Detective Al Quinn had hoped to spend his retirement fishing at his lakeside home and taking care of the local deer. That bubble pops when Gladys Sanders, the sixty-year-old co-owner of an organic farm, is found dead by her two sisters, her body displayed like a scarecrow. On the same day, her son is run over in his kayak. Evidence slips away from the scene right under the noses of two deputies, so Sheriff Clayton asks Al to mentor a younger detective. That simple task explodes into raw danger when three rival biker gangs with ties to Mexican cartels start mixing it up in earnest. ICE Agent Jaime Avila tells Al that old turtles ought to leave the fighting to the young. But when the danger involves Al’s brother, Al dives into the heart of the ruckus. Before the war is over, the gangs just might get to hear the turtle roar.
Throw the Texas Dog a Bone
Human bones found in a furnace at an animal shelter just outside of Austin cause retired detective Al Quinn to be called in to work the case. Before he leaves the shelter, Al adopts a new companion, Tanner, a dog just two days away from being euthanized. Testing shows that the bones belong to more than one person. Al must deal with a pesky FBI human-trafficking team that butts into the investigation while he is training a new detective. At home, he has a houseful of people when he’d planned to live alone, not to mention his new pet. Add a burglary ring whose members threaten his housemates, along with Tanner, and someone will soon be seeing the dark side of Al Quinn.
607 pages, Kindle Edition
Published November 28, 2017
47 people are currently reading
17 people want to read
About the author
Russ Hall
54 books37 followersRuss Hall is author of more than thirty-five books and coauthor of numerous other books. He has been an editor for major publishing companies, ranging from Harper & Row (now HarperCollins), Simon & Schuster, to Pearson. In 2011, he was awarded the Sage Award, by The Barbara Burnett Smith Mentoring Authors Foundation—a Texas award for the mentoring author who demonstrates an outstanding spirit of service in mentoring, sharing and leading others in the mystery writing community. He lives in Lago Vista, on the north shore of Lake Travis near Austin, where he hikes, fishes, and tends a herd of deer that visit daily to peep in the office window and help with the writing.
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
February 22, 2018
I received a free copy via Netgalley in exchange for a honest review.
I just did not get on with these stories.
The plot appeared to be disjointed, jumping about and left me confused in places.
Would not bother reading more as there are better mysteries about.
I just did not get on with these stories.
The plot appeared to be disjointed, jumping about and left me confused in places.
Would not bother reading more as there are better mysteries about.
March 25, 2018
Well~crafted and empathetic without being melodramatic. It is also relatable, pragmatic and/or realistic with just the right amount of compassion and understanding of human nature. I also like the humor and that the author could write a good story without too much use of dirty language in his conversations/dialogues.
1. Al's older and male nymphomaniac (aka Satyromaniac or a person afflicted with Satyriasis aka Don Juanism) brother, Maury, who he has not seen in the last 20 years, has become an unwitting conduit of a Mexican drug cartel distribution network based in Al's county in Austin, Texas. Maury is also a useful bait and tool to draw Al from his retirement and to trap a much bigger fish. Al Quinn's awesome talent of being able to recall and retain whatever he read and observed in the past will later on account for the twist in the story near the end.
2. This story started with a crucifixion~like posing of a sexagenarian's body in the middle of an organic farm called the Three Sisters. There are some macabre humor that naturally comes to mind not to trivialize the gruesome death but "it is what it is" kind of thing. The answer to why Gladys was killed and so was her son was just one of the mysteries here. There is also greed and betrayal considering the billions of money involved in producing high grade cannabis before its use as over~the~counter medicine thus legalizing marijuana production/distribution and putting an end to illegal profits via cannabis. This book may also tweak the reader's moral compass with regard to Irving Dagrell, a proprietor selling military surplus materials and doubling as a fence, who goes out of the US and gives vent to his pedophilia (he pays for the sexual favors of 11~12 year old girls) in countries like Mexico, the Philippines and Bangkok; plus there is also the part referring to the death of a traitorous police officer.
3. The author approached the sensitive and deplorable (also unlawful) practice of human and sex trafficking plus the harvesting of organs (of said victims of the aforementioned crime) with realistic pragmatism and outrage plus compassion reflected in his main characters (also felt by the reader). This serves as a reality check for the uninformed that not only are young men and mostly young women from most third world countries are lured to the US with promises of jobs with better compensations but are instead enslaved into prostitution but ALSO these victims now have a fated destiny of "donating" all their viable organs for transplants. Their bodies disposed off by clandestine cremation on out~of~the~way pet shelters with crematoriums and on landfills. Used... Misused... Abused... then Thrown Away...and Forgotten...
P.S. ~ "I received this book for free from eBook Discovery. I voluntarily post this review. This is my honest review."
1. Al's older and male nymphomaniac (aka Satyromaniac or a person afflicted with Satyriasis aka Don Juanism) brother, Maury, who he has not seen in the last 20 years, has become an unwitting conduit of a Mexican drug cartel distribution network based in Al's county in Austin, Texas. Maury is also a useful bait and tool to draw Al from his retirement and to trap a much bigger fish. Al Quinn's awesome talent of being able to recall and retain whatever he read and observed in the past will later on account for the twist in the story near the end.
2. This story started with a crucifixion~like posing of a sexagenarian's body in the middle of an organic farm called the Three Sisters. There are some macabre humor that naturally comes to mind not to trivialize the gruesome death but "it is what it is" kind of thing. The answer to why Gladys was killed and so was her son was just one of the mysteries here. There is also greed and betrayal considering the billions of money involved in producing high grade cannabis before its use as over~the~counter medicine thus legalizing marijuana production/distribution and putting an end to illegal profits via cannabis. This book may also tweak the reader's moral compass with regard to Irving Dagrell, a proprietor selling military surplus materials and doubling as a fence, who goes out of the US and gives vent to his pedophilia (he pays for the sexual favors of 11~12 year old girls) in countries like Mexico, the Philippines and Bangkok; plus there is also the part referring to the death of a traitorous police officer.
3. The author approached the sensitive and deplorable (also unlawful) practice of human and sex trafficking plus the harvesting of organs (of said victims of the aforementioned crime) with realistic pragmatism and outrage plus compassion reflected in his main characters (also felt by the reader). This serves as a reality check for the uninformed that not only are young men and mostly young women from most third world countries are lured to the US with promises of jobs with better compensations but are instead enslaved into prostitution but ALSO these victims now have a fated destiny of "donating" all their viable organs for transplants. Their bodies disposed off by clandestine cremation on out~of~the~way pet shelters with crematoriums and on landfills. Used... Misused... Abused... then Thrown Away...and Forgotten...
P.S. ~ "I received this book for free from eBook Discovery. I voluntarily post this review. This is my honest review."
June 25, 2020
I have been a fan of Russ Hall’s Al Quinn series since I opened the pages of my first one—Making It Rain in Texas (reviewed elsewhere). Al Quinn is a retired sheriff’s detective in Texas whose former boss Clayton the sheriff has a way of dragging Al back into the action. These are excellent books, with intensity, fast pacing, and often non-stop action. The characters are exceptionally well done, and Hall fully developed his villains in a way that reminds me of Elmore Leonard. A good hero deserves a good villain (or villains) and Hall delivers on both counts.
Fan that I am, I had been reading in jumps and starts within the 6 books in the series, and not following in the logical order of first book in the series followed by the 2nd book in the series, etc… And since each book stands alone and Hall is adept at telling just enough of the back story to keep the personalities straight, no harm done and I could enjoy each book on its own merits.
But, when his publisher put out a three-in-one deal, I purchased the first three books in the series and started reading in order (even though I had already read one of these books). Yeah, it works well starting with book one and following in order. But as I said each book stands alone just fine, but if you want to follow the stories of Al’s randy brother and his nurse Bonnie, and of Al and Fergie, his tall, thin lover and ex-law enforcement herself, starting at the beginning works well too.
All of which is just a lead in to say any book in the series is great.
Fan that I am, I had been reading in jumps and starts within the 6 books in the series, and not following in the logical order of first book in the series followed by the 2nd book in the series, etc… And since each book stands alone and Hall is adept at telling just enough of the back story to keep the personalities straight, no harm done and I could enjoy each book on its own merits.
But, when his publisher put out a three-in-one deal, I purchased the first three books in the series and started reading in order (even though I had already read one of these books). Yeah, it works well starting with book one and following in order. But as I said each book stands alone just fine, but if you want to follow the stories of Al’s randy brother and his nurse Bonnie, and of Al and Fergie, his tall, thin lover and ex-law enforcement herself, starting at the beginning works well too.
All of which is just a lead in to say any book in the series is great.
May 4, 2019
Actually I'm only finished with the first book, "To Hell and Gone in Texas". This was an enjoyable mystery and really got my adrenaline up near the end. The first part involves Al figuring out why someone wants his sex addict brother Maury dead and the rest involves trying to keep from being killed by people who are after Maury.
October 28, 2019
Good reading. You will love Al Quin and his friends and family. Al tries to stay retired but his unique services are requested time and time again. Humor, love and mystery are wound all through this book and all the Al Quin Series. Sit and enjoy by the fire or just about anywhere!
January 31, 2019
This was a very good three books, based in Austin TX area.
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews