Full disclosure: I love this series. Set in the 1970s, it focuses on an Ojibwe girl living in the Red River valley, where she has been mentored by a sheriff who has grown somewhat dependent on her help with cases, partly because she has a gift for gaining information from the dead. It's not a gift she has always welcomed, but after the events of the previous book in the series, she's finding it has mostly abandoned her, which leaves her somewhat bereft. In this case, while plowing a field she noticed a car idling for hours outside a house used by tenants of a local farmer. She eventually goes to check it out and finds a child hiding under a bed upstairs, and the farmer dead of a gunshot wound. The obvious suspects are the girl's parents who have vanished, but that doesn't make sense to Cash Blackbear who knows something else is going on. And then another body is found...

I like the main character and the laconic language of these stories, but what I tend to remember most is the author's descriptions of a land that, to most outsiders, is just boring, flat fields. She really brings it to life and makes its beauty and the connection Cash feels to it visible.

As a fan of the Cash Blackbear series, I was so excited when I saw that there was another one coming in 2025 and knew I had to read it. When Cash finds a farmer dead in his rental farmhouse and the renters, a young Native couple, gone without a trace, she is pulled into another case with Wheaton. This case hits closer to home for Cash, as the couple left behind a young daughter, Shawnee, who Cash is determined to reunite with her parents to avoid foster care and a similar path that she had growing up. She follows her intuition and is able to find answers for every question that is raised and ultimately solve the murder. I like that the smaller storylines that exist throughout the book do not take away from the main one and don’t feel too random, but connected with other characters or storylines from previous books. While you don’t need to read the other books, which I appreciate, you definitely get a better sense of who Cash is as a person, as well as the setting and other characters, by doing so. I have grown to love Cash over throughout the series, and feel a sense of familiarity and comfort with her, and love her relationship with Wheaton. I will always reach for more Cash Blackbear mysteries!

Marcie R. Rendon, author of the powerful novel Where They Last Saw Her, brings back her series character, Cash Blackbear, in a another traumatic, thought-provoking mystery, Broken Fields. This time, it’s Cash and a young Native girl who suffer through current issues, and memories of the past.

It’s spring in Minnesota’s Red River Valley, and Cash is making extra money plowing fields. But, when she notices a car running all day in front of a farmhouse, she finally investigates. In the kitchen, she finds the body of Bud Borgerud, the owner. He’s been shot to death, and his Native tenants, a husband and wife, are missing. Cash feels uneasy enough to search the house, and finds Shawnee, the couple’s daughter, hiding under a bed. The young girl seems in shock. She won’t talk, and Cash suspects she may have seen the killer.

Although Cash calls Wheaton, the local sheriff, and a friend, she’s angry when he insists he has to turn Shawnee over to Child Services. For years, Cash suffered through the foster care system, and she worries about Shawnee, especially when Jean Borgerud, widow of the dead farmer, insists on taking the child. Wheaton may try to shut her out of the case, and out of the investigation of a bank robbery, but Cash’s special intuition, her gift, tells her there’s more trouble in both cases.

When a second body is found on Borgerud’s farm, Cash’s primary worry is for Shawnee. She knows firsthand the trauma and problems that occur in the foster care system, and Jean Borgerud doesn’t seem the motherly type. Cash heads to the White Earth Reservation, searching for Shawnee’s missing mother, but all along she’s determined to find answers for the young girl that reminds Cash so much of herself when she was trapped with uncaring adults.

Broken Fields is a murder mystery, but it’s also an indictment of the foster care system, and the traumas inflicted on Indigenous children. It isn’t often we see Cash Blackbear break down, but her own past comes back to haunt her when she tries to help another child trapped in the system. Cash’s reactions in this book are as impulsive as ever, but her deep scars are evident in this latest story.

Renee "Cash" Blackbear came up through the system. She and her sister and brother were taken away from their mother after she crashed her car driving drunk. Cash went through a lot of foster homes and knows the routine. The one bright spot in her life was Sheriff Wheaton, who found her in the crashed car and has remained a constant in her life. She even works for the sheriff's department occasionally where her intuition has paid dividends in solving cases. Cash finds a body in an empty farmhouse after finishing a day of plowing fields. She has finds a terrified little girl who witnessed the murder. Cash does not want Shawnee disappearing into the system as she did. When the social worker places Shawnee with a widow of the murdered man, Cash gets more and more suspicious. Jonesy, the Native American woman teaching her how to use her intuition, is circumspect as to how Cash's journey will move forward, but Jonesy assures Cash that Shawnee's mother will come forward in time. Cash knows she must protect Shawnee at all costs. Set in the last 70s, this is an interesting look at life at the time Native American rights are becoming an issue. An interesting read.