The Literate Kitty

There are undoubtedly a handful of good reasons why so many of us leave our school friends behind, without a backward glance.     But I’m betting the top reason is simply that the past is where such friendships  should , most often, remain.   For everyone’s sake.       When author Bruce Borgos begins his latest tale,  Shades of Mercy , we find one Porter Beck—the sheriff of a sparsely-populated (but geographically-vast) high-desert Nevada county—the first officer on the scene of the latest in a troubling string of opioid drug-related deaths in his jurisdiction .   Only this time, it  really  hits home... because the victim? Was none other than one of Beck’s closest friends back in school—the second Musketeer of three.   Gutted, Beck returns to the station... but there’s little in the way of solace, there. Instead, he finds more chaos, because in the constantly water-deprived state of Nevada, it’s always fire season, and a good half-dozen major burns were currently raging.   And then, i