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My mom gave us this book and said it was "pretty good, I liked it." I'm always wary of a half-hearted recommendation because I'm so picky in terms of decent writing. Sure, it's a mystery and it'll follow a general structure, but it's the little things that make a mystery worthwhile and if it didn't have that, I'd feel betrayed somehow.

I suspect that what kept me going through this book was the setting. Both in terms of it being set in an Indian reservation and much of the book being a (slow) chase through the wilderness of northern Minnesota. That's different and intriguing. And he's not a bad writer. He knows how to add details about characters and their lives in the appropriate spots and not make it look forced. That's not easy.

Unfortunately, the ending is obvious, although there's not much he could have done about that. But the reason why the woman they are trying to find in the wilderness went there, and what she plans to do when she gets out, rings false for a whole host of reasons. None of which I can divulge, but see if you think that it doesn't seem to jive with what you've learned about Cork O'Connor's town and how the community lives. ( )

Takes you right to the wilderness area with its history great story ( )

Great quick interesting and fun read! ( )

Kirkus Review - Krueger's second novel (Iron Lake, 1998) again features ex-sheriff Cork O'Connor of hardscrabble Aurora, Minnesota, and plenty of harsh weather. Here, a top-of-the-charts but depressed, ex-druggy country-western girl singer, Shiloh, disappears into the two-million acres of the Quetico-Superior Wilderness on the Canadian border. Cork, an old buddy of Shiloh's mother, whose murder remains unsolved, heads a search party that includes two FBI agents, an ex-con, a ten-year old kid, and Shiloh's father. Permeating the tale is the spirit of the Anishinaabe Indians, while the heavy pelts on the muskrats point to a huge, bitter winter ahead. Meantime, some bad guys have tortured to death Wendell Two Knives, the Anishinaabe guide, trying to get him to tell where Shiloh has gone, since they want her just as badly as Cork's search party. Shiloh witnessed her mother's murder, then had amnesia, and through regression therapy seems to have brought up the killer. Was he her mother's lover, a Vegas casino owner named Benedetti, who now wants Shiloh dead? Does all this have to do with the Ojibwa's cash-rich Grand Casino on Iron Lake? Why was Shiloh's therapist murdered as well? Will Shiloh survive to rebuild Ozark Records into an outlet for indigenous music? Cork remains a spritely, intriguing hero in a world of wolves, portages, heavy weather, and worrisome humans, with a third entry on its way.