Deputy Pennington of Kickapoo Falls, Wisconsin must embark on a murder investigation when the bodies of Maggie and Michael Butler are found in a wheat field, which plunges him into a labyrinth of strange twists and turns that helps him solve the murder, but unexpectedly leads him to an assassination plot set for election night. 75,000 first printing. Penzler Pick, February 2002: A book from Steve Thayer is always worth the wait. He has set three of them-- The Weatherman , Saint Mudd , and Silent Snow --in the Minneapolis area and has repeated several of his characters. But in The Wheat Field he introduces a new cast of characters and moves the action to Kickapoo Falls, Wisconsin. The narrator is Deputy Pennington, who takes us back to the year 1960 and the wheat field murders. Pennington has been in love with Maggie since they were in school together, but Maggie fell in love with Michael Butler and married him, so it is a shock to everyone when Michael and Maggie are found together, shot to death in that wheat field. At first glance it would appear to be a murder-suicide. Michael has been shot between the legs and Maggie's face has been shot off. The murder weapon is lying next to Maggie's outstretched hand, and the wheat around the bodies has been pressed down in a perfect circle with no shoe or car marks going in or out of that circle. But there are some odd things about the murder scene, even apart from that perfect circle of wheat. Neither Michael nor Maggie is wearing clothes, yet there are no clothes on the ground. The only clue is the butt of a Lucky Strike lying near the bodies and three perfect holes in the flattened wheat. In addition, Maggie is wearing her wedding ring but not the class ring she always wore. Except for the farmer who finds the body on his land, Deputy Pennington is the first to arrive on the scene. Is this, he wonders, sexual, and did somebody stand by and watch? Soon Sheriff Fats and Trooper Russ Hoffmeyer join him. Hoffmeyer soon admits to Pennington that he was once invited to join Michael and Maggie in a threesome--which he did, the whole episode being filmed. Pennington admits to some jealousy that he was never invited, and it isn't long, of course, before he becomes the major suspect in the double homicide and is arrested. In the background of the story is the 1960 presidential campaign (most of the good folks of Kickapoo Falls are solidly behind Richard Nixon, though Deputy Pennington, before his arrest, has the rare chance for a short conversation with John F. Kennedy when he comes through town). Before the end of the story we will have learned a good deal about Wisconsin politics and the private sexual quirks of many of its fine, upstanding citizens. Steve Thayer has produced here another tour de force of suspenseful and shocking storytelling that puts him in the first rank of today's crime novelists. --Otto Penzler There's something about murder in Wisconsin, Thayer contends, that brings shivers to the public spine like nothing else. Thayer's fifth novel is nothing if not tingle-inducing. Thayer's new hero, a retired deputy in the Kickapoo Falls sheriff's department, ponders a 40-year-old case, hoping to make some sort of sense out of the double murder that has made his life a waking nightmare ever since. In 1960, young deputy Pennington is called to a wheat field at whose center, in a ritual-like circle, are two shotgun-blasted bodies. One of the victims is a woman he has loved, forlornly and secretly, since high school, in 1941. His investigation spins into a world of Kickapoo Falls secrets, even spiraling into a presidential assassination plot. Thayer masterfully blends atmosphere (his description of the Wisconsin Dells before tourism is wonderful), a plot full of shocks, and deeply realized characterization. A full-throttle suspense tale. Connie Fletcher Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved Thayer has a knack for building tension and defining place, and his smalltown sinners are all too believable....Spectacular ending... -- Publishers Weekly , February 18, 2002 Thayer masterfully blends atmosphere...a plot full of shocks, and deeply realized characterization. A full-throttle suspense tale. -- Booklist , February 1, 2002 Wife-swapping and presidential politics bring...excitement to small-town Wisconsin...Alfred Hitchcock and Oliver Stone milk...thrills from the Dairy State. -- Kirkus Reviews Writing as on target as a sniper's bullet. Steve Thayer never misses." -- Tami Hoag, bestselling author of Dust to Dust Steve Thayer is the author of five novels, including The Weatherman and Silent Snow .