About

R.M. Lowery is the award-winning author of the Jakob Larsen Mysteries: "The Gentle Slope," "We Kill Our Own," and "Time Fades Away," as well as "Laytons Grove" and "Tough Messes: Eleven Stories of Crime and Desperation." His short fiction has also appeared in Black Cat Mystery Magazine, Workers Write, The First Line, and others. Learn more at rmlowery.com.

Lowery is also an award-winning independent journalist whose work has been published by the Associated Press, Los Angeles Times, Source New Mexico, Albuquerque Journal, Santa Fe New Mexican, and many others.

He was awarded the 2020 William S. Dixon First Amendment Freedom Award from the New Mexico Foundation for Open Government, and the 2021 Sunshine Award from the New Mexico Press Association for his reporting that highlighted lack of transparency from multiple government agencies.

Featured Work

Laytons Grove

2026
Cover for Laytons Grove

Sean McKenna is a thief, and he’s good at it. It hasn’t made him rich, but he gets by. More importantly, it keeps him from falling into the dead-end employment trap that’s ensnared so many others in Laytons Grove, the small Illinois town where he’s spent his life.

Reagan McKenna stays clear of her brother’s business, but not his life. She would like him to rejoin the family he left many years ago, mostly to save their mother from a broken heart.

Sean is content with the life he’s forged though. He plans his jobs in great detail, always weighing the risk against the reward. However, his partners, Jack and Travis, are less calculating, and their recklessness attracts the attention of Detective Mary Morelli.

As Mary closes in on Sean and his friends, Jack proposes a job that Sean finds too risky and under planned, but Jack moves forward anyway, dragging Sean into the hasty scheme. The disastrous result shatters the peacefulness of the small town, places lives in danger, and inflicts irreparable damage to generations of families.

Other Works

  • Tough Messes: Eleven Stories of Crime and Desperation

    2025

  • We Kill Our Own

    2025

  • The Gentle Slope

    2024

Awards and Recognition

  • 2025 Pinnacle Book Achievement Award for Best Book in the Suspense Fiction Category.
  • 2024 Best News Writing from the New Mexico Press Association.
  • 2024 Top of the Rockies award for short-form features writing from the Colorado SPJ.
  • 2024 Best Ongoing/Continuing Coverage from the New Mexico Press Association.
  • 2023 Best News Writing from the New Mexico Press Association.
  • 2023 Best Education Writing from the New Mexico Press Association.
  • 2022 Best Investigative/Enterprise Reporting from the Colorado SPJ.
  • 2022 Best News Writing from the New Mexico Press Association.
  • 2021 Best Continuing News Coverage from the New Mexico Press Association.
  • 2021 Sunshine Award from the New Mexico Press Association. The award recognizes the best example of covering issues of transparency in New Mexico.
  • 2021 Best Solutions Journalism award from the Colorado SPJ for a four-part series on addiction.
  • 2020 William S. Dixon First Amendment Freedom Award from the New Mexico Foundation for Open Government. The Dixon award is presented annually to citizens and organizations in New Mexico who champion transparency and defend the people’s right to know the affairs of government.
  • 2020 Best News Series from the New Mexico Press Association for a series of stories on drug and alcohol addiction in New Mexico, exploring the roots of addiction, what’s being done about it, and how other communities are addressing addiction.

Press and Media Mentions