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STRANGE THINGS DONE
by Elle Wild
Dundurn, October 2016
304 pages
$18.99
ISBN: 1459733800


Buy in the UK | Buy in Canada

Journalist Jo Silver, escaping a bad decision that cost her a crime reporter's job at a Vancouver newspaper and haunts her still, arrives in isolated Dawson City in the Yukon as winter settles a heavy blanket over the town. On her first day at work, she not only has a murder to cover—but finds herself part of it.

The night before, Jo, out drinking, gets a ride home with Christopher Byrne, an attractive, enigmatic man. But her memory is hazy; all she remembers is Byrne arguing with a woman. And that woman, councilwoman Marlo McAdam and Byrne's ex-girlfriend, is now dead. Not only is Byrne a suspect, but so is Jo, as the bodies begin piling up around her.

Jo is pulled into the story, and to the secrets of the small town, whose population numbers just over a thousand during the cold winter. Dawson City is an inhospitable place, especially after the freeze up, when the Yukon River turns into a slab of ice and the ferry is dry-docked. The airport closes, as well as the highways, as the town is snowed in. Dawson City doesn't even have cell service, and electricity is sporadic during winter storms.

New in town, with a strange housemate, a newspaper editor who doesn't want to run controversial stories, and a pair of flimsy winter boots, Jo must find a way to get the truth into the newspaper—and avoid being the next victim on Page 1. There's no one Jo can really trust, as everyone in town seems to have a dark secret.

STRANGE THINGS DONE, a debut novel, won the 2015 Unhanged Arthur Award, among several honors. It's easy to see why this is an award winner. It's a well-spun thriller, set in a closed community, with the cold, snowy weather bringing in an extra element of menace. I surely wouldn't want to live in Dawson City, but it's a neat place to visit from the coziness of home. I'm hoping this is the beginning of a series, so I can drop in on again on the strange doings in Dawson City.

§ Lourdes Venard is an independent editor who divides her time between New York and Maui.

Reviewed by Lourdes Venard, October 2016

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Contact: Yvonne Klein (ymk@reviewingtheevidence.com)


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