The Blog

Rule of Capture by Ona Russell

Feb 18, 2020 | Featured Book

Debbie Harpham

ABOUT:

Los Angeles, 1928. Oil, oranges and site of the C. C. Julian Petroleum stock scandal, a Ponzi type scheme to rival any in American history and a foreshadowing of the decade’s looming, economic crash. As one of the scheme’s victims, Ohio probate officer Sarah Kaufman–till reeling from the KKK murders she helped solve in Tennessee–is in the city to attend the trial of the perpetrators, in particular of the ”friend” who convinced her to invest. Sarah is eager for justice and committed to seeing the trial through. She’s glad she’s alone, that her lover Mitchell isn’t there, that after court she’ll have time to herself. But when a Mexican woman she barely knows winds up dead, Sarah’s plans are thrown upside down. Suddenly she finds herself in a nightmarish trial by fire, one that takes her from the glamour of Hollywood to the Tijuana frontier, tests her deepest beliefs and leads her to discover not only a killer, but a part of Los Angeles built on a terrible secret. Includes Readers Guide.

Author Ona Russell received the IPPY (Independent Publishers Book Awards) Silver Medal for Rule of Capture in 2015 in the Best West-Pacific Fiction category.

Purchase your copy here.

PRAISE AND RECOGNITION:

“An entertaining whodunit with a striking protagonist and a compelling cultural backdrop…Russell intertwines fictional and non-fictional events in an engaging manner, weaving both the peculiar charms of early Hollywood and the real-life Julian petroleum scandal into her murder mystery.” –Kirkus Reviews

“Perhaps the L.A. Mystery Read of the Summer…” Los Angeles Times Newsletter

“A biting commentary on the uneasy truce between Latino Los Angeles and the city’s entrenched political, cultural, and economic elites.” Los Angeles Review of Books

AUTHOR VISITS:

Author visits with Ona Russell are available via NovelNetwork.com.