A Serpent's Tooth: A Walt Longmire Mystery

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Every once in a while you’ve got to step into the epic, even if it means getting your boots a little muddy; what I know about religion, gas, oil, and Hughes drill bits you could put on the head of a Polycrystalline diamond, but I was fortunate enough to get help from the folks down at the Casper office of the Wyoming Oil & Gas Conservation Commission to steer me in the right directions so that I could sip from the Teapot Dome.

Also helpful were Drew Goodman, who helped me with the religious implications of handling the snakes, David Nickerson, who held the medical kit, and Benj Horack for the .410 snake charmer.

The Teapot Dome Oil Field is a wild place and you need snake gaiters on your boots and a trusty shovel, but it’s even better to have serpentine guides like my own Gail “Coral Snake” Hochman, and Marianne “Diamondback Rattler” Merola. Winding their way through the editing is Kathryn “King Cobra” Court and Tara “Tiger Snake” Singh, copyeditor Barbara “Black Mamba” Campo and Scott “Desert Horned Viper” Cohen. The open road can also be dangerous but not when you’ve got a pack of charmers like Carolyn “Copperhead” Coleburn, Maureen “Multibanded Krait” Donnelly, Ben “Puff Adder” Petrone and Angie “Anaconda” Messina.

And, as always, the little Asp I always hold to my breast, Judy.