Gerald Everett Jones – Author

2020 NYC Big Book Distinguished Favorite in Mystery

Amateur sleuth Evan Wycliff is a disillusioned divinity student who is fascinated by astrophysics. He's found the answers he seeks nowhere. He's dropped out of school and returned to his small-town farm roots in Southern Missouri. He’s also disappointed in love. His beautiful fiancé was a brilliant Jewish scientist, a defense contractor who was killed in a rocket attack in Syria.

These days Evan gets guest preacher gigs and uses his investigative skills as skip tracer for the local car and tractor dealership. In this second novel in the series, Evan counsels a boy who is afflicted with schizophrenia and has been accused of rape. Along with related abuses of the child welfare system, he uncovers a teen trafficking ring run out of a luxury casino resort by a Russian oligarch.

Book Publicists Irwin Award, Best Indies Notable 100, NABE Pinnacle Award - Best in Literary Fiction, FAPA President's Book Awards - Bronze in Adult Fiction.

A lonely widower from Los Angeles buys a tour package to East Africa on the promise of hookups and parties. What he finds instead are new reasons to live.
Aldo Barbieri, a slick Italian tour operator, convinces Harry to join a group of adventuresome “voluntourists.” In a resort town on the Indian Ocean, Harry doesn’t find the promised excitement with local ladies. But in the supermarket he meets Esther Mwemba, a demure widow who works as a bookkeeper. The attraction is strong and mutual, but Harry gets worried when he finds out that Esther and Aldo have a history. They introduce him to Victor Skebelsky, rumored to be the meanest man in town. Skebelsky has a plan to convert his grand colonial home and residential compound into a rehab center – as a tax dodge. The scheme calls for Harry to head up the charity. He could live like a wealthy diplomat and it won’t cost him a shilling!
Harry has to come to terms with questions at the heart of his character: Is corruption a fact of life everywhere? Is all love transactional?

Clifford’s Spiral is a quirkily comic literary novel. Its sardonic tone recalls the wry wisdom of Kurt Vonnegut, and its preoccupation with male centeredness is reminiscent of Philip Roth.

It's not chick lit. It's about young men on the make and failing ever upward. Six short stories plus a thoughtful essay on the genre.