In a small rural town, where hardly ever anything happens, acting sheriff Homer Deter suddenly finds himself investigating the disappearance of a teacher from a local missionary school, Ash Jackson, a local ne’er do well and a pregnant teenager.  An ATF agent shows up who is also looking for Ash.  While Homer is investigating, bones of a murder victim show up in Goode Swamp and a second corpse is found by the highway.  Further complications are caused by a car theft, a twenty-three vehicle pileup, a missing circus tiger and more ATF agents arriving in town.  Homer only has a couple of part-time deputies, so he enlists the help of his moonshiner buddy, Rye Willis, and the town’s eccentric postmistress, Nina Ross who Homer hopes to court.  For Homer Deter, West Wheeling has become the most exciting place on the face of the earth. 

Michael Allen Dymmoch has written this wonderfully entertaining story in the first person from the view of his rather clever, wise and fascinating acting sheriff, Homer Deter.  It’s also written in the dialect of the town and is fascinating as well as entertaining.  This town comes alive for the reader with its many characters and small town lives and prejudices.  Homer takes the reader through all the police procedures as he investigates and logs all his finds.  He shows real wisdom in dealing with the towns many quirky characters.  The reader is drawn into the story from its beginning.  This reviewer highly enjoyed this story.  The reader may wonder with so much going on that the plot may be too complicated, but this story reads very easily with all plot points neatly coming together for a surprising solution at the end.   

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