A Middle Eastern potentate and his entourage are descending on Martha's Vineyard -- and chaos is in the salt air. Ex-Boston-cop Jeff "J.W." Jackson would rather be fishing with his lady Zee, but the island's overtaxed police force needs his help to control the madness their visitor's arrival has stirred up -- especially since the great man will not leave before ceremoniously reclaiming an emerald necklace stolen from his nation a century ago. But when both the jewels and Zee vanish, J.W. is quickly transformed from rent-a-cop to frantic investigator. Because an ill tide has carried desperate men to this idyllic island with murder on their minds. And Jackson suddenly stands to lose everything that he dearly loves.**

Acerbic professor Marjorie Summerharp was reborn on Martha's Vineyard -- her mind and acid-tongue sharpened by the island's gentle waves and whispering breezes. So why would she walk into the ocean on a warm June morning, to be swallowed up forever by the hungry, merciless sea? Ex-Boston-cop "J.W." Jackson knows that evil can flourish even in the most serene of settings. And the more he investigates, the more it appears that the mysterious "accidental" death of the renowned local scholar was more premeditated than it originally appeared. But nosing around in a snake pit of academic jealousy, adultery, and bogus religion could prove deadly for the policeman-turned-fisherman...especially when Jackson exposes too many sinister secrets that are well worth killing for.**

Escaping the city and its violence, ex-cop Jeff "J. W." Jackson found solace in fishing, cooking, and simplyenjoying life on Martha's Vineyard -- and nothing, he figures, will ever entice him to leave. However, suddenly there's a very real possibility that his lady love Zee will be departing the idyllic island forever. And when a young student commits suicide, and a girlfriend-abusing thug starts spewing vicious threats, J. W. seriously considers a temporary escape from paradise. But it's a failed trio of attempts on his own life that ultimately propels him off-island -- and onto the trail of a stalker that's leading Jackson to the perilous peaks of the Colorado Rockies, where he quickly learns that, thorns and all, there's no place quite like his Vineyard home.**

Thanksgiving has come and gone, and hunting season is in full swing on the Vineyard. J. W. Jackson -- retired cop, dedicated fisherman, and passionate cook -- is more or less holed up with his wife, Zee, and their two spunky kids for the winter. At least dear old dad has finally agreed to get a computer to keep them connected to the outside world! Otherwise, their cozy Vineyard home is pretty much cut off from civilization during this time of year.Still, the world has a way of intruding on their idyllic winter setting. When J.W.'s old Vietnam buddy and Vineyard fishing companion, Joe Begay, asks to be met on Cape Cod and virtually smuggled back to the island, J.W. knows something's not right. Joe wouldn't be sneaking around and asking J.W. to do him odd favors if trouble weren't brewing. J.W. also knows that Begay wasn't merely a soldier, but he has also performed highly secretive work for the government ever since Vietnam.Soon, the facts begin to emerge: A few years ago, B...

There's nothing like Martha's Vineyard on crisp autumn days, after the season has ended. The "off-islanders" are finally gone and ex-Boston cop J.W. Jackson is free to relax. But the natives are getting seriously restless this fall, with animal rights activists squaring off against deer slayers and environmentalists butting heads with land developers. Things have reached a boiling point, and it's not long before verbal arrows become real ones. When a most unlikely victim is caught in lethal crossfire, Jackson can't just sit idly by.

When two acclaimed crime novelists and fishing buddies, Philip R. Craig and William G. Tapply, join their remarkable talents, it's the best of both worlds for readers of the first ever Brady Coyne/J. W. Jackson mystery.It's September on Martha's Vineyard, and J.W. is contemplating the serious matter of a tree house for his children and some good fishing in the annual striped bass and bluefish derby with his friend, Boston lawyer Brady Coyne, who'll be on the island to help the elderly Sarah Fairchild write her will. J.W. has a little business, too, having reluctantly agreed to spend some of his valuable surf casting time trying to find a missing woman named Katherine Bannerman, who was last seen on the island a year ago.For Brady and J.W. it'll be law and detecting during the day, but by night they will roam the far Vineyard beaches in search of prizewinning catches.But soon another woman goes missing, a local bully threatens both Brady and J.W., and Brady discovers that...

Life on the Vineyard is good. Maybe too good. The bluefish are running early, and there's plenty of quality fishing time to be spent with ex-cop J.W. Jackson's new baby son Joshua. But an idyllic summer hits a snag when a movie scout from Hollywood invades the beaches. Worse, a longtime nemesis turns up murdered just one day after he and J.W. come to blows, and Jackson is considered by nearly everyone to be the most likely suspect. If he hopes to spend the remainder of the season—as well as many others to come—enjoying simple family pleasures and fine, fresh seafood, J.W. will have to cast his line out and hook the real killer.

For year-round Vineyard residents J. W. Jackson and his wife, Zee, winter brings its own beauty, with uncrowded streets, pristine snowy landscapes, and long, cozy nights by the fire. It can also bring danger.There's a chill in the air one January day when J.W. receives a surprising visit from long-ago pal Clay Stockton. Thrice divorced and still living on the edge, Clay has come to J.W. not to relive the reckless days of their youth but to ask J.W. for help. He's in big trouble and needs to lie low on the Vineyard.And it isn't just Clay who needs J.W.'s assistance; J.W.'s pal Bonzo has made a frightening discovery that may lead to the whereabouts of Nadine Gibson, a young woman who went missing on the Vine-yard almost a year ago. Bonzo once took Nadine bird-watching, and the circumstances connecting Nadine's disappearance to Bonzo are enough to make him a "person of interest" to the police.With two friends in trouble and his own family receiving threats, J.W. must summon...

Martha's Vineyard is home to ex-Boston cop J.W. Jackson, his adored wife Zee, their toddler Joshua, and newborn daughter Diana. For others, the picturesque vacation spot is a relaxing escape. But there is no escape for Julia Crandel and Ivy Holiday, two Hollywood actresses staying in the Vineyard town of Oak Bluffs. Their arrival has incurred the wrath of a pair of local gangsters, and a deadly stalker from out of the young ladies' past has found out where they are hiding. Twin hurricanes are about to slam the idyllic island—one a natural climatic disaster, the other an all-too-human catastrophe—and it looks as if J.W. is going to get caught in the middle.

It's a picture-perfect Vineyard summer, and ex-Boston cop J.W. Jackson finds time for lazy afternoons at the beach with his wife, Zee, and the kids. Nothing could be better, but of course not everything is peaceful, even on this idyllic island. When J.W.'s rich businessman friend Glen Norton invites him to join a golfing foursome at Waterwoods, the island's prettiest club, he's happy to accept. But trouble is waiting for J.W. in the sand trap at the fourth hole—the sand trap with the human hand protruding from below. With circumstantial evidence pointing to J.W., he must act fast, peeling back layers of deceit surrounding old Vineyard families in his search for a killer.

J.W. Jackson, ex-Boston cop turned fisherman, cook, and jack-of-all-trades, is alone on the Vineyard while his wife and children visit relatives. A request from Carole Cohen comes as a blessed diversion. Carole wants J.W. to find the person who's stalking her brother, Roland. Known locally as "The Monk" for his reclusive ways, Roland lives on a beautiful piece of Vineyard real estate that he co-owns with his cousin Sally Oliver. A number of people, including Sally, would do almost anything to convince Roland to sell. Does that include violence? When a body turns up near Roland's land, J.W. has to find out.

At first, the girl J. W. Jackson encounters strolling alone along South Beach seems like your typical teenager. But there's nothing typical about young Cricket Callahan, the spirited only daughter of the vacationing President of the United States. Why is the feisty First Kid so intent upon eluding her Secret Service guardians, and why does the President want J.W. and Zee to watch over her? The answer comes in the form of a dead body. Not even executive privilege can shield the President's daughter from harm unless Jackson roots out a vengeful killer who may be hiding among the President's most trusted.

During his career as a Boston cop, Jeff "J.W." Jackson saw enough of the evil that men do to last a lifetime. So he retired to the serenity of Martha's Vineyard to spend his days fishing for blues and wooing a sexy nurse named Zee. But when a local's boat mysteriously explodes off the coast, killing an amiable young drifter, Jackson finds himself reluctantly drawn back into the investigative trade. For there is a serpent loose in paradise -- and it's contaminating Jackson's lovely, peaceful island with its poisonous venom of drugs and death.**

When J.W. Jackson foils an attempt to terminate former mob boss Luciano Marcus on the steps of Boston's Symphony Hall, it puts a definite damper on Jackson and Zee's newlywedded bliss, especially when the mayhem follows them back home to Martha's Vineyard. Keeping circling sharks from the kill might be more than J.W. can handle.