Winter-Kill

Syracuse University's 1960 Homecoming: The big game, dreamscape posters, voodoo-curse legends, and hyper-inebriation all swirl together for an unforgettable weekend. For Bud Elstein it's even more. It's the beginning of his love affair with red-headed, sharp-witted and curvacious Carlee Stecher.

The affair, however, is not to last. By the next winter, Bud's life and circumstances change radically. In this riveting, fast-paced tale based on actual history, his romantic dreams of both career and Carlee skid off the tracks. He loses her, quits college, and falls into the corruption of a mid-sized American city drowning in graft, gambling, bribery, coercion, prostitution, and murder.

Bud's closest friend, Dave Nelligan, with whom he's worked in the local numbers and policy rackets, is murdered. Seeking vengeance and justice, Bud devises a plan to entice the suspected killer-and rival for Carlee's love-into a midnight duel in a deserted park. Resorting to antique pistols-rumored to have been used 100 years before in a deadly shooting by an aggrieved lover-the two face-off against each other in a howling blizzard.

Once shots are fired, supernatural forces are released. What are they? Where are they from? How can Bud deal with them and with gamblers bent on killing him? Can he rescue Carlee from the police who've jailed her, and himself from horrible demons in sudden confrontation? Against terrible odds, his life and the life of the city depend upon his actions.