Like the illegitimate child of Justified and Sons of Anarchy, The Moonshine Messiah leaps off the page with a rarified air of gritty, hillbilly realism.

Russell Johnson hits the ground running with a novel so explosive you might not be allowed on a plane with it. Appalachian sheriff Mary Beth Cain heads up a cast of characters so well-rounded, they might well have been written by Carl Hiassen, Elmore Leonard or Ace Atkins. The Moonshine Messiah is the kind of book that will make you miss work to finish reading.

Russell Johnson performs an incredible magic trick with The Moonshine Messiah, pivoting between laughs, thrills, and tugs on the heartstrings just as fast as you can turn the pages. And he has created a compulsively readable character in Mary-Beth Cain, a small-town West Virgina sheriff as gutsy as Michael Connelly’s Rene Ballard and as irreverent as Elmore Leonard’s Raylan Givens. Everyone will find something to love in this unforgettable debut.

Readers seeking thematic depth with heavy doses of thrills and suspense will not want to miss Russell Johnson’s The Moonshine Messiah. The novel engages the current sociopolitical conversation without skimping on the action. An array of distinctive and sympathetic characters—including a remarkable female lead—lock horns in a fraught family dynamic with the potential for national and personal consequences, keeping the stakes high, the twists dizzying and the outcomes explosive. A highly entertaining novel that makes a lasting impression, The Moonshine Messiah will leave readers eager to see where Johnson takes his talents next.

Russell Johnson really brings the heat with his debut Southern mystery, Moonshine Messiah. With this intricately woven tale of crime, conspiracy, and corruption, you’ll think you’ve discovered a lost season of Justified. It’s witty, action-packed, and filled with unforgettable characters, headlined by badass sheriff, Mary Beth Cain. My fingers are crossed for a sequel to this winner.

While The Moonshine Messiah is a hell of a crime novel, it absolutely shines as a portrait of rural America striving for hope and relevance in a changing world. Sheriff Mary Beth Cain is a tough and determined protagonist, and perhaps the only character in the wide world of fiction capable of navigating such a fast-moving and explosive plotline. Johnson is at the top of his game—this is small-town Appalachian noir at its finest.

HE MOONSHINE MESSIAH is crazier than a Saturday night at Waffle House, spicier than Nashville Hot Chicken, and as surprising as snow in Savannah.

A rural route odyssey of conspiracy and vice.