Coyota by Martha Egan Nena Herrera-Casey is the coyota, the youngest, in her large extended Mexican-American family. Her life in Albuquerque seems placid enough, teaching Spanish part-time at the University and selling handicrafts imported from south of the border at the flea market. But Nena has nightmares, vivid, chilling, violent and recurring. When she overhears two Drug Enforcement Agents’ whispered conversation, she becomes unwittingly entangled in a mysterious “accident”, a fiery plane crash that kills a former student. Was the conversation she overheard actually the plot to murder him? As her life unravels, rogue DEA agents conspire to set her up on bogus drug charges. And her worst night-mare stalks her through the Mexican desert. 184 pages Hardcover: ISBN: 978-0975588-12-3   $21.00 Paperback: ISBN: 978-0975588-13-0   $12.00 Publisher: Papalote Press (October 1, 2007) Orders: 888-229-7109 or papalotepress@sbcglobal.net [DOWNLOAD PROLOGUE & CHAPTER 1] Coyota — quick and clever. She will jump into readers' hands. "Coyota is the consummate Southwestern novel, a story of the peaceful Mexicos, new and old, and the underbelly of corruption that lies beneath them. . . .Smart, feisty, vulnerable Nena Herrera-Casey, an innocent and principled bystander . . . is swept onto the vicious trading field where honest commerce with Mexico and drug trafficking collide. Egan tells her story with the sure hand of a writer who knows both sides of the peso." - Sara Voorhees, Author of The Lumière Affair: A Novel of Cannes "Nena Herrera-Casey (Coyota) is a young Mexican-American woman living a peacefully normal existence in Albuquerque. When she inadvertently runs afoul of two crooked Drug Enforcement agents who want to kill her, peace and normalcy are the last adjectives to describe what becomes of her life. Martha Egan has written a bi-culturally smart, swift moving, page turner...." - Page Stegner, author of The Selected Letters of Wallace Stegner "Egan knows her territory, She's got the ambience, culture, and color of Mexico and New Mexico nailed. Stay tuned for what follows." - Gloria Fraser Giffords, author of Sanctuaries of Stone and Light: The Churches of Northern New Spain, 1530-1821. Heart-catching suspense propels this story of a young woman’s discovery of the strength inherent in her Mexican-American heritage. Coyota skewers the hypocrisy of the "War on Drugs", revealing the self-serving motives of rogue DEA agents interested only in protecting themselves. Coyota's story is set in a keenly observed, lyrically written spare desert landscape that the author has known well for over 30 years.