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sandin954's review
3.0
Not quite as good as the previous two books in the series. While I did like the rural Iowa setting and very realistic police procedural aspects in this book the plot was just a bit too out there for me.
rclz's review against another edition
4.0
These are good but they always feel like their about fifty pages too long. They're a bit slow at times. Like the characters though.
ericwelch's review against another edition
4.0
Carl Houseman, a deputy sheriff in Nation County, Iowa keeps watching the Weather Channel as the worm-like jet stream moves gradually north bringing the promise of a January thaw. In the meantime, he and his colleagues, not to mention the FBI and Iowa DCI, have their hands full trying to solve the murders of two burglars on a remote farm. There is the usual turf war between the various departments.
The FBI is reluctant to release information to their “hick” fellow officers (there is a very funny scene where the local officers have to remind the FBI city types that tailing someone by car in a remote county where four cars constitutes a traffic jam is not something easily accomplished).
Harstad, a deputy sheriff in Iowa for twenty-six years, obviously knows his rural police work and writes well. Their adversary is the pseudonymous Gabriel, a former special operations Army officer and explosives expert. He has convinced some locals they owe no allegiance to the federal government and can set up their own country, but they need a lot of money to buy a small yield nuclear weapon from the former Soviet Union to give themselves leverage. (I’ve always thought the way to deal with these crazies who want their own countries is to let them have their several hundred acres, fence them off, and then not issue them entry visas into our country. See how long they can last without being able to head to the nearest grocery store to buy food. ☺ )
Houseman is called to assist another deputy in stopping a suspicious driver. It’s Fred, a known burglar, obviously quite shaken, who points them to a farm where his cousins have been killed. The trail leads to Gabriel and black, ultra-fast snowmobiles (these turn out to be FBI issue). Houseman works with his DCI crony, Hester Gorse, (now stationed for her normal rotation on the General Beauregard, a gambling boat on the Mississippi — a great spot for Houseman who loves the boat’s buffet). They gradually collect evidence that suggests Gabriel is going to hit five banks in the area. Good police work narrows down the location to the bank taking the Beauregard’s deposits.
Harstad writes a denouement that is quite realistic and plausible, I thought, unlike some other crime novelists who seems to believe a book must end in an orgy of violence.
The FBI is reluctant to release information to their “hick” fellow officers (there is a very funny scene where the local officers have to remind the FBI city types that tailing someone by car in a remote county where four cars constitutes a traffic jam is not something easily accomplished).
Harstad, a deputy sheriff in Iowa for twenty-six years, obviously knows his rural police work and writes well. Their adversary is the pseudonymous Gabriel, a former special operations Army officer and explosives expert. He has convinced some locals they owe no allegiance to the federal government and can set up their own country, but they need a lot of money to buy a small yield nuclear weapon from the former Soviet Union to give themselves leverage. (I’ve always thought the way to deal with these crazies who want their own countries is to let them have their several hundred acres, fence them off, and then not issue them entry visas into our country. See how long they can last without being able to head to the nearest grocery store to buy food. ☺ )
Houseman is called to assist another deputy in stopping a suspicious driver. It’s Fred, a known burglar, obviously quite shaken, who points them to a farm where his cousins have been killed. The trail leads to Gabriel and black, ultra-fast snowmobiles (these turn out to be FBI issue). Houseman works with his DCI crony, Hester Gorse, (now stationed for her normal rotation on the General Beauregard, a gambling boat on the Mississippi — a great spot for Houseman who loves the boat’s buffet). They gradually collect evidence that suggests Gabriel is going to hit five banks in the area. Good police work narrows down the location to the bank taking the Beauregard’s deposits.
Harstad writes a denouement that is quite realistic and plausible, I thought, unlike some other crime novelists who seems to believe a book must end in an orgy of violence.
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