Breaking the Peyote Circle: A Fernando Lopez Santa Fe Mystery (Hardcover)

Former Santa Fe Police Sargeant Antonio Blake has a history of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder from his time in the Marines during the First Iraq War. For help he turns to a quack psychologist named Frank Tate, AKA Doctor Ziggy, who treats his patients suffering from PTSD and anxiety with peyote, which contains mescaline, a psychoactive substance. During one peyote circle Blake has a flare-up and grabs another patient in the therapeutic group ceremony by the neck. At the end of the ceremony Dr. Ziggy accuses Blake of choking to death the other patient. In response, Blake goes into hiding and asks his friend, former Santa Fe Police Detective Fernando Lopez, to find the real killer. Lopez interviews the other patients in the peyote circle, who give him widely different stories about what happened that night. When evidence surfaces that points to Dr. Ziggy and his drug supplier, Joey Alhambra, both suspects flee to northern New Mexico. Lopez and Blake pursue the two suspects to Taos and then to Red River, where the pursuit concludes in a violent conclusion with some shocking surprises.