Battle Mountain
A perennial figure in mystery and suspense novels is the “second banana,” a sidekick/bodyguard of a series’ central character who is often more skilled, more focused and more lethal. Think Spenser and Hawk, Elvis Cole and Joe Pike or Easy Rawlins and Raymond “Mouse” Alexander. And then, on an entirely different level of lethality, there is C.J. Box’s Nate Romanowski: a loner, survivalist and falconer who was originally a supporting character in the Joe Pickett novels, but has taken center stage over the past several books (so much so that he has acquired a sidekick of his own, Geronimo Jones). The latest in the Wyoming-set series, Battle Mountain, follows Nate in search of Axel Soledad, his wife’s murderer, who cheated almost certain death at the hands of Geronimo (you had ONE JOB, Geronimo). Meanwhile, unbeknownst to Nate, Soledad is a key figure in a case that Joe has become peripherally involved with. The governor’s son-in-law and his hunting guide have gone missing deep in the mountain wilderness. And somewhere within that wilderness are Soledad and his partners in crime, who are preparing for a massive criminal endeavor and have exactly zero desire to leave living witnesses to their presence. As is often the case with shifting narratives, the reader knows more than at least some of the characters at least some of the time, but do not let that put you off. There are still ample surprises in store.
Cold as Hell
Kelley Armstrong’s latest mystery, Cold as Hell, is number three in her, um, chilling series of novels about Haven’s Rock, a remote settlement in the Yukon—which is already quite remote by most measures—in which people can go off the grid, usually to hide from those who wish to do them harm. But predators have their own devious ways of seeking out prey: A Haven’s Rock woman gets drugged (maybe) and then abducted (definitely), only to be saved by the fortuitous intervention of a fellow villager who hears her screams above the noise of the heavy winds. The second victim is not so lucky. Complicating matters is the fact that Detective Casey Duncan, one of the chief law enforcement officers of the town, is deep into the third trimester of her difficult pregnancy. Further complicating matters is the fact that the other law enforcement officer, Sheriff Eric Dalton, is Casey’s husband, and the only one who can fly the small airplane that will take her to the hospital. That distinction may prove to be academic, though, as a raging snowstorm precludes air travel for the time being. Let it be said that there is no shortage of tension here: stolen drugs, baby imminent, phones not working, a killer on the loose and a village full of people with secrets, more than one of whom can become a loose cannon under pressure.
Leo
A tongue-in-cheek aphorism dating from medieval times (but often misattributed to Oscar Wilde) suggests that “No good deed goes unpunished.” As Deon Meyer’s latest novel, Leo, begins, that saying must be going through the minds of South African police detectives Benny Greissel and Vaughn Cupido. In their previous outing, The Dark Flood, the duo exposed a massive corruption scheme, for which they have been rewarded with banishment. The university town of Stellenbosch is some 50 kilometers—and 50 light-years—distant from the rampant scofflawism that makes Cape Town a fascinating place to be a cop. Although it is something of a demotion, that cloud has had a bit of a silver lining for Benny, as his upcoming nuptials make up one of the three subplots of the book. A second subplot features an old nemesis getting recruited for a pretty audacious heist, and the third involves the killing of a bicyclist and the subsequent murder of her suspected killer. Perspective shifts early and often in the narrative, but Meyer toggles seamlessly from one to the next, deftly tying them all together in a timely fashion. By the way, speaking of timely: For having such a short title, Leo is quite a hefty tome—464 pages—so book out your time accordingly.
★ White King
The third and final installment of Juan Gómez-Jurado’s Antonia Scott trilogy, White King possesses the same “I cannot put this damn book down” allure as its two predecessors, 2023’s Red Queen and 2024’s Black Wolf. The main character, Antonia Scott, is an amalgam of Stieg Larsson’s Lisbeth Salander and Keigo Higashino’s Detective Galileo, with perhaps a bit of Stephen Hawking mixed in for good measure. Her interests and knowledge are wide-ranging and eclectic; she speaks more languages than the typical mobile phone voice translator (Telugu, for example, an Indian language from which she conjures up an appropriate word to fit her situation at the moment—“rakṣakuḍuha,” which means, in her words, “the bodyguard without armor who throws himself naked into the path of the arrow”). Antonia has been tasked with solving three crimes by her longtime adversary, Mr. White, in order to save her partner and dear friend, Jon Gutierrez. Thankfully, she’s arguably the most gifted on-the-fly crime solver in the history of thrillers, making connections that stymie those around her (and the readers of her exploits), until the final reveal.
