Save the Last Dance For Me by Edward Gorman, 230 pages

As Black River Falls, Iowa, prepares for a presidential election campaign visit from Vice President Richard Milhous Nixon, Reverend John Muldaur is stirring up the town with both his anti-Catholic, anti-Semitic circulars and his snake-handling ceremonies. When Muldaur drops dead on his altar, however, it's not from a snakebite but from strychnine-laced Pepsi. With only a week before her good friend Tricky Dick comes to town, Judge Esme Whitney enlists her friend the struggling lawyer and occasional investigator Sam McCain to prevent the population of Black River Falls from looking like "a bunch of hillbillies." Once again, McCain must confront local prejudices, secrets, and dim-witted police chief Cliffe Sykes, Jr. to solve another small-town mystery in the acclaimed series launched with The Day the Music Died.