No one describes ice and snow better than Steve Hamilton. Alex McKnight - his hero - may be icy and remote but the atmosphere is always way colder.
The frozen north woods of the United States is a favorite venue for crime/mystery writers and Steve Hamilton is the premier author representing and depicting this area of the country. Set in Michigan's Upper Peninsula - where that states meets the Canadian border - Hamilton's books are all about atmosphere and locale. When I started my collection, Hamilton was already on book # 3 and closing in on the fourth, so I went back and started at the beginning, with "A Cold Day in Paradise," Hamilton's 1998 offering.
The star of Hamilton's series is Alex McKnight, though this rugged ex-cop still has a hard time stealing the thunder from the frozen venue the books are set in. Alex could be a clichι - retired cop, tragic background, brooding loner - but Hamilton has fleshed him out and he is a multi-dimensional, real character whom we care about and root for. The book won the award for Best First Private Eye Novel of the Year in 1998 and deservedly so; even better, Hamilton has kept apace of his fast start out of the blocks and the series simply gets better and better as it goes along. Alex is highly likable, despite his solitary ways; in many ways he reminds me Michael Connelly's Harry Bosch and Hamilton's writing is similar to Connelly's in its crispness and no-nonsense approach. But no matter how intriguing the character, one can't help but admire Hamilton for his evocative depiction of the frigid landscape and thankless environment in which the books are set. Alex is one cool dude, but the background is always cold, colder, coldest and Hamilton is a good enough writer that the reader can just about feel his breath turn to vapor as he turns the pages. Hamilton is a terrific writer and his Alex McKnight series is one of the best.
