Series:

Clare Fergusson and Russ Van Alstyne Mysteries

8 primary works • 9 total works

Book 1

Cover of In the Bleak Midwinter
It's a cold, snowy December in the upstate New York town of Millers Kill, and newly-ordained Clare Fergusson is on thin ice as the first female priest of its small Episcopal church. The ancient regime running the parish covertly demands that she prove herself as a leader. Her blunt manner, honed by eight years as an Army chaplain, is meeting with a chilly reception from some members of her congregation. Chief of Police Russ Van Alstyne, in particular, doesn't know what to make of her. When a newborn baby is abandoned and a young mother is brutally murdered, Clare has to pick her way through the secrets and silence that shadow the town like the ever-present Adirondack mountains. As the days dwindle down and the attraction between the avowed priest and the married chief grows, Clare will need all her faith, tenacity and courage to stand fast against a killer's icy heart.

Book 2

Cover of A Fountain Filled with Blood
It's summer and a violent attack on a doctor triggers a series of gay-bashing episodes. The Episcopalian priest Clare Fergusson and Police Chief Russ Van Alstyne, who has been carefully avoiding one another, are thrown together. Still fighting their mutual attraction, Russ rudely bars Clare from taking any part in dealing with the violent homophobia, and from contributing to the investigation. As the reluctant partnership continues, closeness becomes inevitable. The pair find that it's hard enough trying to solve a crime with an assortment of valid suspects; it's even harder to tamp down a powerful personal attraction.

Book 3

Cover of Out of the Deep I Cry
On April, 1 1930, Jonathon Ketchem's wife, Jane, walked from her house to the police department to ask for help in finding her husband. The men, worn out from a night of chasing bootleggers, did what they could. But no one ever saw Jonathon Ketchem again.. Now decades later, someone else is missing in Millers Kill. This time it's the clinic's physician that bears the Ketchem name. Suspicion falls on a volatile single mother with a grudge against the doctor, but Reverend Clare Fergusson isn't convinced. As Clare and Russ investigate, they discover that the doctor's disappearance is linked to a bloody trail going all the way back to the hard scrabbled Prohibition era. As they draw ever closer to the truth, their attraction for each other grows increasingly more difficult to resist. And their search threatens to uncover secrets that snake from one generation to the next - and someone who's ready to kill.

Book 4

Cover of To Darkness and to Death

Book 5

Cover of All Mortal Flesh

All Mortal Flesh

by Julia Spencer-Fleming

Published 1 October 2006
Episcopal priest Clare Fergusson attempts to prove her lover, police chief Russ Van Alstyne, innocent of the murder of his wife.

Book 6

Cover of I Shall Not Want

I Shall Not Want

by Julia Spencer-Fleming

Published 1 June 2008

Book 7

Cover of One Was A Soldier

One Was A Soldier

by Julia Spencer-Fleming

Published 1 April 2011

Book 8

Cover of Through the Evil Days

Through the Evil Days

by Julia Spencer-Fleming

Published 5 November 2013
When a raging fire quickly becomes a double homicide and kidnapping, expectant parents Chief of Police Russ Van Alstyne and the Reverend Clare Fergusson must deal with personal and professional issues they never before encountered.

"On a frigid January night, Chief of Police Russ Van Alstyne and Reverend Clare Fergusson are called to the scene of a raging fire that quickly becomes a double homicide and kidnapping. Which is the very last thing Russ needs. Currently he's struggling with the prospect of impending fatherhood. And his new wife is not at all happy with his proposal for their long-delayed honeymoon: a week in an ice-fishing cabin. The vestry of St. Alban's Church has called for the bishop to investigate Clare's "unpriestly" pregnancy. She has one week to find out if she will be scolded, censured, or suspended from her duties. Officer Hadley Knox is having a miserable January as well. Her on-again-off-again lover, Kevin Flynn, has seven days to weigh an offer from the Syracuse Police Department that might take him half a state away. As the days and hours tick by, Russ and Clare fight personal and professional battles they've never encountered. In the course of this one tumultuous week the lives of the Millers-Kill residents readers have come to love and cherish change forever. Readers have waited years for this newest book and Julia Spencer-Fleming delivers with the exquisite skill and craftsmanship that have made her such a success"--

Cover of Julia Spencer-Fleming's Letters to a Soldier