The Boy in the Snow

Starred review from September 24, 2012
The two-week 1,150-mile Iditarod dog sled race from near Wasilla to Nome, Alaska, forms the backdrop for McGrath’s outstanding second mystery featuring half-Caucasian, half-Inuit Edie Kiglatuk (after 2011’s White Heat). A native of Ellesmere Island, Edie comes to Alaska to help her ex-husband, Sammy Inukpuk, who’s trying to regain his self-respect by racing. In the forest outside Wasilla, Edie encounters a mysterious bear that leads her to the frozen body of a baby boy lying in the saddle of a snowmobile. Edie, a homesick, guilt-ridden “outsider in her own world,” seeks to untangle the disturbing truth behind the infant’s death, aided by her policeman friend, Derek Palliser, who’s also assisting Sammy in the race. McGrath has a firm grasp on a little known culture, its values and language, and excels at bringing to life such characters as conniving Anchorage mayor Chuck Hillingberg and his power-hungry wife, Marsha. This affecting novel should melt even the most frozen human hearts. Agent: Kim Witherspoon, Inkwell Management.

October 15, 2012
Canadian High Arctic native Edie Kiglatuk is diverted from her main mission in Alaskato back up her ex-husband, Sammy Inukpuk, in the Iditarodwhen she finds the body of an infant boy in the snow. Police suspect that the Old Believers, a sect broken from the Russian Orthodox Church, are behind the baby's death and arrest one of its members, a man Edie saw in the area. But even outside the comfort zone of her native Ellesmere Island, Edie is fierce in her desire for justice for the baby and is driven to find the truth. With the help of her friend, police sergeant Derek Palliser, who's also in Alaska to help Sammy, she uncovers a scheme of sex trafficking of underage girls and the black-market sale of babies. Half-Inuit Edie, who debuted in White Heat (2011), here finds herself at mortal risk from the cold, so masterfully described that it chills the reader. McGrath adds an element of Inuit spirituality to this fast-moving mystery of corruption and cover-ups, meeting expectations established by the compelling series opener.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2012, American Library Association.)