Frequently, librarians are asked to find a book that is "like" another book or "like" an author, who a reader enjoys. We try to keep lists of authors and books, which are similar in nature. Our shorthand for these lists is "read-a-likes". Two fine mystery writers, who set their books on Indian reservations and use them as an opportunity to write about Native American culture, are Tony Hillerman and Margaret Coel. Hillerman’s signature series is set in the Navajo Reservation in northeast Arizona, extending into New Mexico and Utah. Margaret Coel sets her series in the Wind River Reservation of Wyoming, home of the Arapaho and Shoshone.

The protagonists of Hillerman’s books are Lieutenant Joe Leaphorn and Sgt. Jim Chee, both of the Navajo Tribal Police. Hillerman based the Leaphorn character on a Texas sheriff, he knew as a young man. Joe Leaphorn is intelligent, honest, wise and humane in his use of police powers. Hillerman describes Leaphorn as much more like himself and someone, who he would like as a next door neighbor. Sgt. Jim Chee’s character is a conglomeration of hundreds of students Hillerman taught at the University of New Mexico. Idealistic, romantic and sometimes reckless, Chee yearns for the "old days and strives to keep Navajo values relevant in the modern America consumer culture. In each book Hillerman attempts to reveal insight into the Navajo culture.

The last Hillerman book I read was "The Fallen Man". The skeleton of a man is discovered by climbers on a ledge under the peak of Ship Rock Mountain. Investigation proved the body had lain there for eleven years. Joe Leaphorn returns from retirement to connect the skeleton to a sniper and a mystery he could never solve. Hillerman is a prolific writer. Three of his newer Leaphorn/Chee books include the following:

• "The Sinister Pig"—a mystery involving the Jicarilla Apache Natural Gas Field
• "Skeleton Man"— Leaphorn must find and trace a body at a 50 year-old plane crash site
• "The Shape Shifter" in 2006—involving the sudden reappearance of a priceless, Navajo, tale-teller rug, supposedly destroyed in a fire many years earlier.

Margaret Coel’s mysteries focus on the Arapaho culture of the Wind River Reservation in Wyoming. It is a kick for me to read these books because I lived in Lander, Wyoming, for a while, and she writes about an area and places that I know. Her central characters are Arapaho lawyer Vicky Holden and Father John O’Malley. Father John is an outsider. A Boston Irishman, he is a stranger both to the region and the culture. He is a recovering alcoholic, who was "banished" to St. Francis Mission on the reservation. His alcoholism, however, helps him understand the problems many Arapaho’s face in dealing with alcohol. He loves the reservation and culture and fears being reassigned

Because one of her main characters is an outsider, Coel knew that she needed an insider to balance her stories. Vicky Holden appeared to her in a dream. Growing up "traditionally", Vicky escaped an abusive marriage to become a lawyer. She later returned to the reservation, hoping to help her people. A continuing tension in the novels is the relationship between Father John and Vicky. They are in love and are physically attracted to one another. Because of Father John’s vow of celibacy, it is a relationship that cannot be. Coel admits that she does not know how the relationship will develop.

Coel’s latest novel, "The Drowning Man", is about the theft of a priceless petroglyph (carving) from a canyon wall and the attempt to recover it. Margaret Coel will appear at the Wyoming book Festival in Cheyenne on September 14-15, 2007. She lives in Colorado. I recommend Tony Hillerman and Margaret Coel to anyone who enjoys reading well-written mysteries, finds Native American culture interesting or likes novels set in the American West.

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