World Famous Comics: Winter of the Wolf Moon: A Mystery (Alex McKnight Novels)
Winter of the Wolf Moon: A Mystery (Alex McKnight Novels)
By: Steve Hamilton Publisher: Minotaur Books Average Rating: Binding: Mass Market Paperback Label: Minotaur Books Number of Items: 1 Number of Pages: 320 Publication Date: February 15, 2001
Product Description: Ex-cop and sometime P.I. Alex McKnight endures the bitter winter of Michigan's Upper Peninsula in his log cabin with warm fires and cold Molsons. When Dorothy Parrish, a young Ojibwa woman, asks him for shelter from her violent boyfriend, McKnight agrees. But after secreting her in one of his cabins, he finds her gone the next morning. McKnight suspects vicious, hockey-playing Lonnie Bruckman of abducting the woman. But his search for her brings on more suspects, bruising encounters, and a thickening web of crime, all obscured by the relentless whiplash of brutal snowstorms. From the secret world of the Ojibwa reservation to the Canadian border and deep into the silent woods, someone is out to kill-and McKnight is driving right into the line of fire...AUTHORBIO: STEVE HAMILTON, born and raised in the Detroit area, now works for IBM in upstate New York, where he lives with his wife and children.
Amazon.com Review: Snow doesn't just fall on cedars on Michigan's Upper Peninsula: it coats everything, mobile and inanimate, in a treacherously quick, dangerously thick blanket of white. As Alex McKnight observes, gazing out the window of his cabin in Paradise, "It looked like about six inches of new snow. Around here, that qualifies as scattered flurries." Given this climate, the urge to hibernate is perfectly understandable--batten down the hatches, throw another log on the fire, and wait until the spring thaw. For Alex, the denning impulse is as much psychological as it is physical. Haunted by memories of his deadly failures as a cop, a private investigator, and a lover, Alex wants nothing more than to plow his driveway, be cordial to the snowmobilers who rent his cabins, and lower his core emotional temperature to the forgetting point. Unfortunately, he's got friends who get in the way of his seasonal plans.
When Vinnie LeBlanc, an Ojibwa Indian, convinces Alex to fill in as goalie for his hockey team, slap shots and hard checks are soon the least of his worries. Instead, he becomes embroiled in a tangle of conflicting allegiances; one of his opponents, Lonnie Bruckman, a bigot and a psychotic, is terrorizing the Ojibwa reservation in ways both personal and professional: he abuses his girlfriend, Dorothy Parrish, and sells "wild cat," a methamphetamine derivative, to members of the reservation. Dorothy--desperate to escape her Ojibwa heritage but reluctantly acknowledging its force--turns up on Alex's front door with a mysterious canvas bag and a plea for shelter: "'The wolf moon means it's time to protect the people around you because there are wolves outside your door.'" But the next day, she's gone.
As Alex, devastated by his inability to protect Dorothy, tries to find her, he must confront Bruckman--for whom a snowmobile is less a recreational vehicle than an instrument of torture; a mysterious Russian named Molinov; the combined forces of the local police and the DEA; and, it seems, even those he has always considered friends. Luckily for Alex, Leon Prudell, "a two-hundred-forty-pound whirlwind of flannel and snowboots," who really, really wants to be a private investigator, is right there to lend a hand. Leon adds a welcome note of comic relief to the novel (as does, to be sure, Alex's own dryly sardonic wit), but the book's tone is largely elegiac: "It was the middle of the day, but with the sun hidden behind the clouds and the weight of snow in the air, there was an oddly muted light, dim yet persistent, as each snowflake seemed to glow with its own energy. I stopped for a moment ... hypnotized by the sight of it and by the sound of my own breathing." Surviving winter takes many kinds of courage, and the reader will be enthralled by Alex's efforts to disprove Molinov's ominous warning, "'Once you freeze all the way through to your soul, you will never feel warm again. You'll see.'"
Steve Hamilton won the 1999 Edgar Award for his first Alex McKnight mystery, A Cold Day in Paradise, and Winter of the Wolf Moon will reassure readers that neither beginner's luck nor sophomore jinx troubles this author. --Kelly Flynn
Another excellent installment in this most enjoyable series This book picks up closely after A Cold Day In Paradise (Alex McKnight Novels) ends off. An Indian girl comes to Alex McKnight for help getting away from her violent and drugged up boyfriend. He thinks she'll be safe in one of his cabins, but in the morning she has disappeared leaving behind signs of a struggle. Assuming that her boyfriend tracked her down, Alex is determined to find her and ensure that she's safe. However it will emerge that there are several others who are equally determined to find her.
Steve Hamilton's books are highly enjoyable to read. They tear along at a good pace, with plenty of intrigue to hold your interest and a sardonic sense of humor as well. They also make wonderful use of their setting in northern Michigan. Admittedly this installment has a slightly weak ending, but still better than many other books in this genre. It's a hard book to put down - I read it in a day. If you haven't read this series yet, consider yourself lucky at what's in store for you, but do start with A Cold Day In Paradise (Alex McKnight Novels).
McKnight sure hates snowmobiles . . . After I finished reading "A Cold Day in Paradise" by Steve Hamilton, I was ready to read the sequel. It didn't turn out to be as good as the first, but it still isn't that bad. The first problem I had with "Winter of the Wolf Moon" was the pacing of the story: the entire novel was slower, and a bit less stimulating than the original. Another problem I had with "Wolf Moon" was the way everything unfolded. I was mildly disappointed how everything turned out. From Dorothy's white bag to Molinov's brutal actions, I didn't find here the shocks and thrills that I had found in "Paradise."
Still, I enjoyed it. Alex McKnight and Leon Prudell do seem to make a great duo, and the supporting characters make it all more intriguing. I'm ready to read "The Hunting Wind" now.
Grade: B+
Liked it about as well as the first one. I liked this book pretty well. At least well enough to give another book of his a try sometime in the future. I like his writing style overall. I seldom read first person narratives, but he writes in a way that I forget this is first person. I found some of his ploys a little unreal. I am about the same age as the main character and if I was dragged behind a snowmobile and hospitalized I certainly would not go running off to confront a huge hoodlum in a bar the next day or two.
The Molinov letting him go ploy was silly beyond belief but it is a ploy used by a lot of writers in this genre and on the movies. Believe me, if you or I are in the position where we see a drug lord kill three people, you can bet that we are going to be next. He isn't going to let us go because he thinks we might have something in common and could be useful down the road.
But other than that I found the book enjoyable.
Decent Story but a Weak (Unsatisfactory) Second Act One of the problems when a author begins a series, is that he knows that at some point he will have to create a secondary line of interest from the one that was set-up in the first book. Alex McKnight is an ex-minor league catcher and ex-Detroit Michigan Policemen who retired from the force after being shot three times in the chest, with one bullet being left close to his spine. He lives in the Upper Peninsula (UP or Yoopee) of Michigan in the town of Paradise. He makes his living by renting out cabins that have access to Lake Superior in the summer and snowmobiling trails in the winter.
More than anything, McKnight doesn't want to be a cop or even a private investigator ever again. But just like in the first book he is pulled back into criminal investigation by the whims of chaos. He has even got a 'partner' in the guise of a snowmobile salesman, Leon Prudell (who we met in the first book). His only 'friends' are a Ojibwa Indian Vinnie Le Blanco and Jackie (as Scotsman) who runs the Glasgow Inn.
The first book was filled with references to the Ojibwa way of life and the way the people of the first nations looked to the land. Yes some of it was 'hokie' but it's what makes these types of stories interesting. In this book, the Ojibwa way of life is only tangential to the story and feels as if it was thrown into the story at the last minute.
There is a lot of flippancy and smirking in the way some characters are presented. Two DEA agents are named 'Champagne' and 'Urbania'; could this be a plug for the University of Illinois at Champagne-Urbana? Two Russian bad guys are named, 'Roman' and 'Pearl'; the word for novel in Russian (like in French/Italian) is Roman, but I'm not sure of the "Pearl" connotation. Vinnie La Blanco's (who is an off-reservation Indian) last name translate to "The White". Throw in Mc"Knight" and the Sault (Soo Michigan) Ste. Marie Police Chief "Maven" and it starts to get a little overwhelmingly 'cutesy'.
Lastly, we are left with the knowledge that at some time in the future there will be a showdown between McKnight and a 'vicious' Russian mob boss named Molinov (he shoots two of his own men for killing an 'innocent' woman); and you get the feeling that this book was only written to prepare the way for the rest of the series. It's way too over the top when it comes to violence for violence sake.
Not to mention the unrealistic physical recovery of McKnight, after being dragged behind a snowmobile and suffering a partially collapsed lung and concussion, he walks out of the hospital the same day that his chest tube is removed. The guy is forty- eight years old and can hardly walk the day after playing goalie in a thirty minute hockey game; but can leave the hospital with a couple of broken ribs and a three inch incision in his side! Enough said, let's get back to reality.
Striking discription and story This is my second "Alex" Novel. What can you say. You can feel that snow and cold, the boredom that can develop in the Upper and the people that live there and how they cope. His living in Michigan and observations have made him a great writer, any of us that live here in Michigan can feel all that he discribes. His plotting is great also both storys had me wondering all the way to the end. I will continue to read all his books as I progress. They are all great.
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