Deborah Coates Wide Open Blog Tour with Giveaway and Guest Post

I am so excited to have Deborah Coates here to talk about 10 Things About South Dakota in a guest post here at Paranormal and Romantic Suspense Reviews.

Deborah is currently touring to promote her newest release Wide Open.

Thanks so much Deborah for allowing me to join your blog tour with a Giveaway and Guest Post!

Please take it away, Deborah!

10 Things About South Dakota

Thanks so much for letting me visit on your blog today!  I wanted to talk a bit about the setting for Wide Open since it's an important part of the story and why things happen as they do.

Wide Open is set in western South Dakota.  To give you a little grounding before you dive into the novel, here are a few things about South Dakota you might not know:

1.      Sioux Falls is the largest city.  Population:160,000.

2.      Harney Peak is the tallest mountain between the Alps and the Rockies.

3.
The geographical center of the US is 20 miles northeast of Belle Fourche, SD (that's the geographic center of the entire US, not just the contiguous states)4.

The Sturgis Motorcycle Rally in Sturgis, SD draws up to 450,000 people every year

5. The Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in western South Dakota covers 3,500 square miles

6. There are 3.7 million cattle in South Dakota and 800,000 people.

7. Jewel Cave is the third-longest cave in the world with more than 120 miles of passages.

8. The Corn Palace! (http://www.cornpalace.org/)

9. The Minuteman Missile National Park. http://www.nps.gov/mimi/index.htm

10. Wall Drug (www.walldrug.com)

Wide Open is set in western South Dakota for a couple of reasons.  One, I consider it a liminal space, a space that's in-between.  It's not quite the green rolling hills of the typical Midwestern state nor yet, the romantic old West of the more Western states.  My characters felt like they belonged in western South Dakota, in wide open spaces and in-between spaces.   At the beginning of Wide Open, Hallie doesn't really know where she belongs anymore and western South Dakota looks to her like a place both familiar and alien.

But mostly I set Wide Open in western South Dakota because I love the prairie and the big sky and the wide, wide open.

Toward the beginning of Wide Open, Deputy Davies takes Hallie to the remote location where her sister's body was found:

They headed down a shallow slope toward Seven Mile Creek itself. There were scrub trees along the creek. To the north were two groupings of big old trees seven or eight deep separated by a hundred feet or so, windbreaks for a ranch house that no longer existed.

Deputy Davies stopped the car, and Hallie climbed out while he was still turning off the engine. She thought it was warmer than it had been when they left West Prairie City, but it was hard to tell be - cause Dell and Eddie exited the car with her, like traveling with her own personal blast of arctic air. The clouds broke apart just then, the sun streaking through like the victor of some ancient battle.

“Here?” Hallie said as the deputy came around to her side of the car. “What was she doing here?”

“I don’t know,” he said. But he thought he knew, Hallie could tell. He thought she’d come out here to kill herself.

She stalked away from him. Between the road and the windbreaks was mostly prairie grass, some still green from summer, but most of it gone dry and brown. Tangled brambles tugged at Hallie’s pant leg as she walked. She could see tracks through the hip-high prairie grass, tire tracks that crossed and crisscrossed each other. Dell, the police, an ambulance maybe, but also old tracks — high school kids and hunters, couples and loners looking for someplace no one would find them, at least not for a while.

Giveaway Rules

A reader who leaves a comment on today’s blog will win a copy of Wide Open (US and Canada eligible only). The contest will be open until 11:59 PM EST on Thursday, March 29th.  Please leave your email address in the comments section. Good luck and thanks so much for stopping by!

Wide Open [Hardcover]

Product Description


When Sergeant Hallie Michaels comes back to South Dakota from Afghanistan on ten days' compassionate leave, her sister Dell's ghost is waiting at the airport to greet her.

The sheriff says that Dell's death was suicide, but Hallie doesn't believe it. Something happened or Dell's ghost wouldn't still be hanging around. Friends and family, mourning Dell's loss, think Hallie's letting her grief interfere with her judgment.

The one person who seems willing to listen is the deputy sheriff, Boyd Davies, who shows up everywhere and helps when he doesn't have to.

As Hallie asks more questions, she attracts new ghosts, women who disappeared without a trace. Soon, someone's trying to beat her up, burn down her father's ranch, and stop her investigation.

Hallie's going to need Boyd, her friends, and all the ghosts she can find to defeat an enemy who has an
unimaginable ancient power at his command.