Death on the Night Watch

Reverend Robert Vander Laan regularly gets into hot water with his Dutch American denomination because of his offbeat ministry to gang kids, hippies and the bar crowd. That kind of trouble seems minor, however, compared with his discovery of a gang girl's bloody corpse. Now Rob must decide whether his ministry includes solving the murder and preventing the murders of more of his "congregation." Death on the Night Watch is a 79,000-word mystery set in 1969 in Grand Rapids, Michigan. With a motley crew of helpers-including his seventy-year-old secretary, the president of the Lost Souls gang, and a sexy cocktail waitress-the clergyman seeks to stop and solve the murders, risking much of what he holds dear. When Rob's snooping begins to have dangerous consequences for his family, his marriage hits the skids. The police detective assigned to the case views Rob and his ministry are a major hindrance to the cops' efforts to rid the streets of gangs and hippies. But is there a deeper reason for Detective Johnson's hostility? The story explores the conflict between the expectations of others and one's own sense of calling or duty, even as it dances between the horrors spawned by evil minds and the laughter that keeps the heart alive.

After graduating from seminary, I worked as a Christian Reformed street minister in Grand Rapids, MI, after which I worked at an ecumenical counseling ministry in Grand Rapids, serving for six of those years as Executive Director. In 1997 I left Grand Rapids with my wife to fulfill our dream of living and traveling in an RV and to have more time to write. I have published many magazine articles, mostly in RVing and travel magazines.