This image is the cover for the book Second Cousin Once Removed

Second Cousin Once Removed

Family can be murder. Just ask Henry Atkinson. A slam-bang series debut “reminiscent of those stories told by Dashiell Hammett . . . dark, and gritty” (Tessa Talks Books).

Henry Atkinson’s life as an attorney is slow, predictable, and lonely, given his divorce and his ex-wife’s custody of the kids. He recently took up genealogy as a hobby to fill the time, but it doesn’t do much to spice up his mundane routine.

Until the day he prods at a dead end of one of the branches of his family tree. Who is this cousin Shelley, whom he’s never met or even heard of in years? Ignoring a warning to leave well enough alone, Henry still doesn’t find much in his deeper dive into the mystery—just a concerning criminal record for the man that finally convinces him to drop the matter. But Shelley is a man who doesn’t want to be found or even looked for. And now he knows someone has been looking.

Faster than he knows what’s hit him, Henry is propelled into sudden mayhem, receiving ominous threats, meeting mysterious strangers, and running for his life. Second Cousin Once Removed is a fast-paced, sweaty-palm thriller that will keep you hooked until the last page.

“An enthralling, unique, and captivating story that makes it impossible to put the book down.” —The Artsy Reader

Kenneth L. Toppell

Ken Toppell wanted to write when he went to the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. He was there during a tumultuous time, the start of the sit-in campaigns, the onset of the civil rights movement. He graduated with a degree in History and Political Science before he went on to Emory University School of Medicine in Atlanta, Georgia, and postgraduate training in Houston, Texas, and in the army. Over the next forty-eight years, Ken did his writing on medical wards and in intensive care units. As a surgeon, Ken saw organ transplants go from rare procedures only done by celebrity doctors to a new surgical specialty. Passionate physicians implemented new forms of medical research and brought HIV/AIDS from an epidemic with a 100 percent mortality rate to an outpatient disease. There were new tools and new drugs, and Ken learned why medicine is called a practice. As the years passed by, Ken began to give lectures in American History, and he had some time to do a new kind of writing. He now lives in Plano, Texas, where he reads, writes, and enjoys life with his wife of fifty-three years.

Brown Books Publishing Group