She gets off to a rocky start when she shows up at the reservation expecting to find an office to work in and an apartment to sleep in, and her arrival is a total surprise to Durango Yazzie, the Navajo in charge of the cultural center. Durango isn’t exactly hostile, but Amanda doesn’t find him too helpful either. But the lady is determined and improvises her way into some semblance of a routine.

There are lots of things going on at the reservation. Durango is somewhat preoccupied with his own difficulties of dealing with an old flame who has made a mess of her life and with a local rancher who is laying claim to some property that has been in the Yazzie family for several generations. When Amanda starts receiving warnings and strong suggestions that she should leave the reservation and abandon the inquiries about her father, Durango tries to juggle his own problems to make time to protect Amanda.

The story moves on to deal with a less than scrupulous newspaperman who knows more than he’s saying about the accident that took Amanda’s father, and then the unexpected appearance of Elliot Sheffield, Amanda’s ex-fiancé. Things get further complicated with the involvement of grave-robbers and stolen artifacts as well as a secret Navajo society created to thwart the activities of those who would desecrate sacred burial grounds. And then there’s the matter of Amanda’s father. Is he really dead?

Harrison does a masterful job of painting very visible characters and challenging them with an interesting and fast moving plot. Her descriptions of the desert Southwest are on a par with Tony Hillerman’s. The book is listed as a romantic suspense, but I’d call it pure adventure and an absolute pleasure to read.