Murder in a Cold Climate
Author:
Genres: Literature & Fiction, Mystery, Thriller & Suspense
Book Type: Paperback
Author:
Genres: Literature & Fiction, Mystery, Thriller & Suspense
Book Type: Paperback
#1 of a series set in the Northwest Territories of Canada, featuring Matthew "Matteesie" Kitologitak, an Inuk (singular of Inuit) Inspector for the RCMP. Actually, he's been primarily working for Northern Affairs, not doing much police work but attending conferences living mostly in Toronto. We know from the get-go that Matteesie is not your everyday hero--the opening pages see him with his long-time mistress in the northern town of Inuvik, waiting to fly out to Leningrad for a conference. (His wife, a white woman, is back in Toronto.) He's also not your typical burly-brawny tough guy--at 5'6" with a brown, round face, he doesn't exactly scare many folks, even bundled up in his parka.
His RCMP boss, Buster, calls and asks him to look into something for him as a favor (it's been several years since he did any police work)--the disappearance of a small plane that had a well-known government official's son as the pilot. Meanwhile though, a murder happens right in front of Matteesie and he feels his inspector's instincts kick into gear as he puts that incident first--and of course after digging a bit, figures the two incidents are actually connected. Off he goes across the wild northern wilderness trying to track down a killer and find the connection to the missing plane.
This book provided a great sense of place and a immersion into a culture that I didn't know all that much about. The author brought home in a very real way just how isolated things are up near the Arctic Circle, and how things most of us 'down here' (and even in southern Canada) take for granted--including the usual police procedures--which just aren't the same there. I liked Matteesie but the story itself was kind of all over the place, especially at first; it was hard to keep people and places straight in part because of the strange names, and it wasn't until the middle third of the book that I finally started 'getting' it enough so that the storyline made more sense. All in all, though, an enjoyable book and I will at some point continue reading on if I can lay hands on the second in the series.
His RCMP boss, Buster, calls and asks him to look into something for him as a favor (it's been several years since he did any police work)--the disappearance of a small plane that had a well-known government official's son as the pilot. Meanwhile though, a murder happens right in front of Matteesie and he feels his inspector's instincts kick into gear as he puts that incident first--and of course after digging a bit, figures the two incidents are actually connected. Off he goes across the wild northern wilderness trying to track down a killer and find the connection to the missing plane.
This book provided a great sense of place and a immersion into a culture that I didn't know all that much about. The author brought home in a very real way just how isolated things are up near the Arctic Circle, and how things most of us 'down here' (and even in southern Canada) take for granted--including the usual police procedures--which just aren't the same there. I liked Matteesie but the story itself was kind of all over the place, especially at first; it was hard to keep people and places straight in part because of the strange names, and it wasn't until the middle third of the book that I finally started 'getting' it enough so that the storyline made more sense. All in all, though, an enjoyable book and I will at some point continue reading on if I can lay hands on the second in the series.
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