Dead of Winter
book review

By Christina Hager
Skiff Staff

One by one, the bodies are found. They are cops, each murdered in a unique yet equally brutal way. Their bodies left beside morbid death cards. The small town of Loon Lake has become target for a psychopath’s vengeance, and with each body found, everyone still remains a suspect.

In P.J. Parrish’s newest novel, “Dead of Winter,” only one man seems fit to solve this puzzle, Detective Louis Kincaid. A young and hardheaded police officer seeking a calmer life in the once-quiet town, Kincaid received a spot on the police force to replace the first victim.

Now, a target himself, he is assigned to the case in a race against time to stop the madman from killing again. However, nothing seems to go Kincaid’s way. He is assigned a partner, Jess, who is obviously the chief’s favorite member of the squad. However, Jess is wild and unstable, and he thinks with his instincts and fists instead of his head.

Kincaid is forced to rely on this hothead, while trying to understand why the ever-so-posh and intelligent chief would hire, and respect, such a man. This in itself causes great controversy.

While Kincaid is hot on the trail of the maniacal police killer, he is also butting heads with his chief, an ominous and odd character named Gibraltar. He spouts about Haiku and chess in the same breath as threatening to revoke Kincaid’s badge. Besides his troubles with the chief, Kincaid also encounters a beautiful and intriguing woman named Zoë, who threatens to take his mind of the case.

However, upon finding out he is a cop, she throws him out of her cabin and refuses to speak with him again. Frustrated and utterly alone in a strange town where even his own chief does not trust him, Kincaid resolves to do anything to find the killer — even if it means risking his own life and badge.

“Dead of Winter” starts off with anticipation and suspense as the killer strikes within the first three pages. From then on the reader is hooked.

The story, gripping and dynamic, twists together details from Kincaid’s past with the troubles behind the seemingly quiet police force to create a compelling and creative plot line. The reader is left guessing the killer’s true identity until the last pages and is swept away with the author into the deep, darkness of winter.

Christina Hager
c.m.hager@student.tcu.edu