Murderers, thieves, junkies, those who batter and assault others, rapists, fraudsters, con-men, general whacks.

These are not only the people we meet in Trey R. Barker’s fiction, but some of the people he deals with in the World on a daily basis. But in Barker’s world, both fictional and real, there are also lovers and heroes, the divine and profane, the wonderful and the wonderfully average.

Barker was born in west Texas and raised with music and books and not much else. For a time, his mother was a bookkeeper at a number of clubs (dives all but lovingly so), and there was always music playing. At home, sitting in front of his mother’s bookshelves, dipping into and out of science fiction, humor, horror and crime, there was also music. Which would explain why his fiction is full of both music and criminals.

Barker spent nearly two decades as an on-again/off-again journalist (along with all kinds of other odd jobs) before falling into law enforcement in North-Central Illinois. He is a patrol sergeant and crisis negotiator, and spent a few years working on both the state and Federal level in task forces dedicated to online child sexual exploitation. He is the author of more than 200 short stories, as well as the Barefield trilogy --- 2000 MILES TO OPEN ROAD, EXIT BLOOD, DEATH IS NOT FOREVER --- published by Down & Out Books. Those books are reflections of the darker side of west Texas and are as stripped down and fast moving as anything you’re likely to read. Think David Goodis, Jim Thompson, James Crumley, Ken Bruen.

His new series are the Jace Salome books, the newest of which is WHEN THE LONESOME DOG BARKS (also from Down and Out Books). He is currently either chasing bad guys around the county, or writing new stories.

Books by Trey R. Barker

When the Lonesome Dog Barks: A Jace Salome Novel

by Trey R. Barker - Fiction, Mystery

Two bodies, recently beaten to death, are discovered on the edges of Zachary County. There is a recent attempt to break into the security office at a resort in nearby Rooster County. And the Zachary County Jail has exploded with seemingly random fights. When Deputy Sheriff Jace Salome finds a smartphone in the jail, she learns the random fights are anything but, that they have been filmed and then emailed from the phone to an intricate web of private email servers and access-only websites. The two dead bodies, as well as the investigation of the resort break-in, and Jace’s look into the fights, all collide when she discovers that a dead girl had been in the Zachary County jail and that video exists of her getting beaten both in the jail and in the security office of the hotel.