Overview

Everyone knows who killed Maggie Schneider. But why? On the morning of March 14, 1958, breeder Maggie Schneider, the Poultry Queen of Lipan County, is shot and killed while feeding her prize-winning, White Holland turkeys on her farm in south central Texas. Everyone knows who did it, but finding the killer isn’t so easy. The search uncovers a troubled family history of insanity, accidental deaths, and suicides. Was Maggie Schneider’s murder the result of a tainted bloodline, a family feud gone too far, or something more sinister? Inspired by true events, novelist Cynthia Leal Massey weaves an intricate tale that spans the decades from the Great Depression to the crippling drought of the fifties. This is not a whodunnit. The mystery here is more profound: Why did he do it?

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9781965766262

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Reviews

""For murder mystery fans, Well of Deception, the latest offering from Cynthia Leal Massey, is certain to please. Massey's phenomenal research skills and vast knowledge of South Texas history are highlighted throughout this effort. Language, local customs, and law enforcement procedures of the mid-twentieth-century Texas Hill Country are accurately depicted as the drama involving family and murder plays out. Don't miss this one!"" -- William O. Gibson, Chief of Police (ret.), San Antonio Texas Police Department Massey expertly webbed together various characters' families, psyches, and motives. In this fictional retelling of a true Texas crime, I wanted to scream out the murderer's name several times before another twist baffled my conclusions and reignited my mind's sleuthing. Well of Deception is captivating from the start!"" -- Jane Little Botkin, multiple award-winning author and past vice-president of Western Writers of America Massey's novel is an absorbing, spot-on evocation of a time and place, and a vivid portrayal of a tough, troubled, extended family dealing with the harsh realities of farm life in Texas in the late 1950s - drought, loneliness, obsession, and shameful secrets."" --Donis Casey, author of the Alafair Tucker Mysteries

Author Information

Cynthia Leal Massey is a former corporate editor, college instructor, and magazine editor. She has published hundreds of magazine and newspaper articles, and several award-winning books, including Death of a Texas Ranger, A True Story of Murder and Vengeance on the Texas Frontier, which won a San Antonio Conservation Society Publication Award and a Will Rogers Silver Medallion Award, and What Lies Beneath, Texas Pioneer Cemeteries and Graveyards, also a SACS Award winner. Her first novel, Fire Lilies, a saga of the Mexican Revolution, was an Electronic Publishing Industry Coalition Award Finalist for Best Historical Fiction and its sequel, The Caballeros of Ruby, Texas, was a WILLA Literary Award Finalist for Best Original Softcover Fiction. Cynthia also won the Lone Star Award for Magazine Journalism for her article “Is UT Holding Our History Hostage?” published in Scene in SA Monthly. The article was also a finalist for the Texas Institute of Letters O. Henry Award for Magazine Journalism. Born and raised in San Antonio, Texas, Cynthia has resided in Helotes, twenty miles northwest of the Alamo City since 1994. She served on the town’s city council for sixteen years. She holds a master’s degree in English from St. Mary’s University in San Antonio. A full-time writer, she is a past president of Women Writing the West and a member of Western Writers of America. Well of Deception, a historical crime mystery set in a fictional Texas county, was inspired by a true story.

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