Book cover for Desert Ghosts by Roberto Picado and TBD
2026 Released
332 Pages
6-7 Hours
Audiobook Unavailable
Hardback Unavailable
Monk PressISBN 9780971096165

The desert does not forget.

In Desert Ghosts, the haunting second installment of Roberto Picado's The Bombastic Adventures in the Arizona Desert, the past refuses to stay buried-and the cost of survival rises with every step forward.

Marikler is running out of time. Driven by a mother's relentless need to reclaim her son, she is forced deeper into a world shaped by deception, violence, and impossible choices. The desert stretches endlessly before her, indifferent to her struggle, unforgiving in its silence. Every lead comes at a price, and every decision pulls her closer to a truth that may destroy what she is fighting to save.

Ron Yawkey is a man burdened by failure. What began as a descent into a dangerous underworld has left him marked-physically and emotionally. Now, as the consequences of his past close in, Ron must navigate a shifting landscape of alliances where loyalty is fleeting and trust can turn deadly without warning. Redemption is no longer a distant hope; it is a necessity he may not survive to achieve.

As their paths converge once more, Marikler and Ron are drawn into an escalating conflict that stretches across the desert's hidden corridors-where criminal networks, quiet betrayals, and unseen forces collide. What lies ahead is not just a fight for survival, but a reckoning with the choices that brought them here.

In Desert Ghosts, Roberto Picado expands the stark, immersive world first introduced in Black Market Bones, delivering a darker, more emotionally charged narrative that explores the weight of consequence and the fragile nature of redemption. The desert itself becomes a silent witness-its vast emptiness holding secrets, its beauty masking a relentless danger that spares no one.

With cinematic intensity and deeply atmospheric prose, Picado crafts a story that is as haunting as it is unflinching. Readers drawn to morally complex characters, high-stakes tension, and narratives that linger long after the final page will find themselves pulled into a world where survival is uncertain and the past is never truly gone.

Because in the desert, nothing disappears.

It only waits.

Roberto Picado

Roberto Picado is the author of The Bombastic Adventures in the Arizona Desert, a dark, atmospheric series set against the stark beauty and brutal realities of the American Southwest. His work blends cinematic tension with deeply human storytelling, exploring themes of survival, greed, faith, and the fragile line between justice and desperation along the Arizona border.The series begins with Black Market Bones, a gripping debut in which three lives collide in a dangerous web of deception, crime, and survival. It continues with Desert Ghosts, a relentless and emotionally charged sequel that expands the world and deepens the stakes, following its characters through pursuit, reckoning, and the cost of redemption.Picado's writing has drawn comparisons to authors such as Cormac McCarthy and Don Winslow, combining stark, evocative prose with morally complex characters and high-stakes narratives. Like the desert landscapes he portrays, his stories are both haunting and unforgiving, where beauty and violence exist side by side and every choice carries consequence.With a style that is immersive, unflinching, and deeply atmospheric, Picado crafts stories that linger long after the final page. He continues to expand The Bombastic Adventures in the Arizona Desert, with future installments forthcoming.

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