title: A Book of Tongues: Volume One of the Hexslinger Series
author:  Gemma Files 
description: A Pinkerton detective infiltrates a Wild West gang led by a spell-casting preacher in this boundary-busting horror&ndash;fantasy debut. Agent Ed Morrow is dispatched by a professor of magical research to evaluate the hexslinging abilities of Rev. Asher Rook, a renegade chaplain who survived his own hanging, and his lover, the prickly sharpshooter Chess Pargeter. As Morrow becomes part of the gang, the Aztec goddess Ixchel slowly seduces Rook into a bloody ritual marriage that endangers Pargeter and leads their followers down a road to hell. Files smoothly weaves an unusual magic system, Aztec mythology, and a raunchily explicit gay love story into a classic western tale of outlaws and revenge. Though it grows somewhat cumbersome in the leadup to a cliffhanger that demands resolution in the planned sequel, this promising debut fully delivers both sizzling passions and dark chills. <I>(May)</I> <BR>Copyright &copy; Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
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  > > THE FIVE SECOND RULE FOR KISSING
  
  > > THE NORTHUMBERLAND NINE SERIES
  
  > > DAYNA QUINCE
  
  > > ![](images/00006.jpg)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  > CONTENTS
  
  > [Chapter 1](index_split_003.html#filepos7214)
  
  > [Chapter 2](index_split_004.html#filepos22537)
  
  > [Chapter 3](index_split_005.html#filepos59014)
  
  > [Chapter 4](index_split_006.html#filepos100566)
  
  > [Chapter 5](index_split_007.html#filepos116078)
  
  > [Chapter 6](index_split_008.html#filepos123125)
  
  > [Chapter 7](index_split_009.html#filepos149377)
  
  > [Chapter 8](index_split_010.html#filepos160101)
  
  > [Chapter 9](index_split_011.html#filepos170563)
  
  > [Chapter 10](index_split_012.html#filepos181128)
  
  > [Chapter 11](index_split_013.html#filepos205980)
  
  > [Chapter 12](index_split_014.html#filepos227736)
  
  > [Chapter 13](index_split_015.html#filepos243766)
  
  > [Chapter 14](index_split_016.html#filepos283581)
  
  > [Chapter 15](index_split_017.html#filepos297675)
  
  > [Chapter 16](index_split_018.html#filepos309264)
  
  > [Chapter 17](index_spli