INCOMING

• Paul Bishop, Sand Against the Tide.  Crime novel.  "Calico Jack Walker has just retired after thirty years on the LAPD, but it doesn't look like he's going to get a chance to enjoy life on his fishing boat, Thieftaker.   Thieftaker had been chartered by a couple of hardcases who looked like they were more interested in feeding the fishes than in catching them -- but a lot of people like deepsea fishing.  It's a mistake for a cop to ignore his instincts...Now Jack, and his ex-partner tina, are going to find out just who is stupid enough, or dangerous enough, to try to hijack a cop's boat, and murder a cop's son."
• William Hopson, High Saddle.  Western.  "Who was the stranger riding into town alone?  He was hard, cold, spoke only a little and when he did they wondered about his strange accent.  The questions he asked chilled the townspeople.  Was he a bounty hunter, tracking down his prey with quiet cunning?  Or a man with a memory which he would not allow to touch him?  He cared for no human being, it seemed.  Had the Apaches seen to that?"  Looks like someone needs a much better blurb writer.
• Richard Laymon, Dark Mountain.  Horror.  "for two families, it was supposed to be a relaxing camping trip in the California mountains.  They thought it would be fun to get away from everything for a while.  But they're not alone.  The woods are also home to two terrifying residents who don't take kindly to strangers -- an old hag with unholy powers, and her hulking son, a half-wild brute with uncontrollable, violent urges.  The campers till need to get away -- but now their lives depend on it!"
• Dana Stabenow, editor, Powers of Detection.  Fantasy/mystery anthology with  twelve stories "set in in worlds where sleuths may wield wands instead of firearms -- and criminals may be as inhuman as the crimes they commit."  The copyright notice includes Martin H. Greenberg's Tekno Books.