Review: In the Shadow of the Glacier by Vicki Delany

Author: Vicki Delany
Publisher/Format: Blackstone Audio, 9hr, 52 min;302 pages equivalent
Narrator Carrington MacDuffie
Subject: Small town crime, women on police forces
Setting: Trafalgar, British Columbia
Series: Constable Molly Smith novels
Genre: police procedural mystery
Source: public library

This is my first one in this series, but you can bet it won't be the last. A great little not quite cozy police procedural with a protagonist Moonlight (Molly) Smith who is just beginning her career on the Trafalgar police force in small town British Columbia. Her pairing with veteran detective (recently moved from the BIG CITY) John Winters is perfect and bodes well for future episodes in the series.

Molly's parents are Vietnam era draft dodgers. Her mother is still pychologically back in the 70's and neither parent is at all pleased when their daughter joins the police force. When Molly is pulled from being just a beat cop to help detective Winter investigate the murder of a big time investor in the town (a body that Molly discovered), things get even dicier. The deceased, Reginald Montgomery, has been quite vocal in his opposition to dedicating a "Peace Park" to commemorate those who left the US rather than fight, so assuming that people who opposed the opposer would want him removed leads the police to looking for a peacenik who had opportunity.

The well detailed motivations and characters in this one kept me with the book til the end. I had it as an audio and it was quite well done by - especially with just a nice touch of Canadian accent.

I'm getting ready to spend July and August reading almost nothing but cozies, so there will definitely be another Constable Molly Smith on the menu. In fact, I already have #5 (Among the Departed) on my NOOK, but I'm going to try to find 2,3, and 4 before I tackle that one.