The best mystery books with a courageous main character who, against all odds, wins!

First, I love ALL the books this man has written, and for so many reasons! They’re set in Minnesota and have a Native American cast that persists from book to book, including the guy I love the most, Henry Meloux, the ancient “mide” (which means “healer”). In this book, one of Krueger’s latest, Henry figures prominently. He’s quiet, and yet people from even far away come to consult him and be healed by him. I love that he walks between our world and the spirit world so easily and sees so much that most of us miss. His character has given me permission to listen deeply to my own intuition. It’s funny how literature can affect us that way, right? Teach us things we long to learn. This book and this character do that for me in spades. 

Also, in this book, another fellow, Prophet, is a fierce presence, a guardian who watches over Henry and all who come to him for sanctuary. Prophet, in an earlier book, was a supreme bad guy tasked with hunting down Henry and killing him! Henry spoke gently to him and redeemed him. I wish there were more Henrys in the world, don’t you?

Ok, but back to this book. Henry is a central presence, but I love that the book also foregrounds, subtly, how Native American women’s deaths are so often overlooked, whereas white women’s are not. Here, a prescient little Native American boy named “Waboo” (“Little Rabbit”) has Henry’s gifts and, while looking for blueberries, finds the grave of a young Native woman. I admire that he’s not scared; he simply sees that she’s troubled, even in the afterlife. And then a white woman’s body is found.

It’s then that another of my favorite characters in this book series—Cork O’Connor—steps in to investigate. And then his daughter comes home for a family wedding, and I learn, as the book unfolds, that she’s dying. Her father, Cork, doesn’t know that. I felt horrible because I’ve gotten to know his daughter over many books, and here she is, soon to be gone. And I know it before her father. It breaks my heart for him. And the daughter struggles with it—she’s there, dying, yet there to celebrate a “new beginning” for a family member. I felt her struggle with the injustice of death so palpably, and yet she keeps up a brave front and doesn’t tell anyone because she doesn’t want to spoil a joyous time. I just fell in love with her more and more.

But this book takes us step by step through how she comes to understand this transition (and, of course, Henry helps her), which gave me solace and some things to think about for my life and for the lives of the people I love.

And yes, the mysteries of the deaths are solved, as they always are in these books, and Cork must once again muster all his courage and persistence (even with a broken heart about his daughter’s news) in following every lead and confronting every danger to accomplish that. Spirit Crossing is a book—to me—filled with courage, love, and soul. And, of course, characters I take with me into my own life. I truly love these books.

I don’t know about you, but when I find an author I like, I always hope there’s a series. And that’s the case here—Cameron’s, Arlis Cutter, is the investigator in each of the books, and he’s just the kind of guy I want to know—he’s strong, persistent, smart, and doesn’t ever need to talk about himself or how good he is at his job. His work speaks for itself.

In this book, he’s in a small Inupiaq village up by the Arctic Circle to investigate the death of a girl found frozen in the permafrost of a whaling family’s cellar. And this points to the other things I really like about this book (and the others in the series): they’re set in the indigenous community of Alaska; I always learn a lot about that culture from the books; and Cameron somehow weaves Arliss’ personal challenges into the cases he works on. 

You see, Arliss’ brother died in what seemed like an accident in Alaska, but Arliss learns by relentlessly investigating, that it was clearly murder. And to boot, Arliss is in love with his dead brother’s wife and has been since the three of them were very young. But I do love this guy because he will not step forward, even in his brother’s death, because his brother left two young sons and he doesn’t want to do anything to disrupt their lives any more than they already are. And I sympathize with him so much and want him to be happy because, in the face of how he feels and his commitment to respecting the children, he relocates to Alaska to watch over the family in his brother’s absence. But he never mentions a word to his brother’s wife about how he feels, though I know he's in turmoil within, and it makes me want to jump in the book and yell at her—“For goodness sakes, marry him!”

In this book, the frozen girl has a prehistoric tooth on her that is similar to something Arliss’ brother gave to his kids before his death. So I feel the same angst (I think) Arliss does—his brother’s death wasn’t an accident and he loved his brother, so he’s driven to do anything to find the truth even while he’s in anguish about his feelings for his brother’s wife. So he asks, “Are the deaths related? Will solving the girl’s murder help him discover what happened to his brother?” Of course, by this time, I’m so invested in all this, I just have to know!

And then, of course, his brother’s wife is calling Arliss to make sure he’s ok, while he’s up there near the Arctic Circle. So, yeah, I’m thinking Arliss is not the only one with feelings here . . . but I’ll have to keep reading the books to figure out what happens with that, and you can bet I will.

And then there’s also deadly polar bears.

As usual, Arliss has to face a ton of resistance and difficulty in solving the case, and I’m on the edge of my seat rooting for this quiet, strong, heartbroken, resourceful man as he does what he always does—gets the job done.

As with William Kent Krueger, I love all of Sandford’s Prey novels (and there are a lot!). This is the first one I read, and I guess I got hooked because I want to be—if I’m honest—either one of the main characters that persist through his books, and that appear in this one. Virgil Flowers is a lithe, laid-back, really smart guy who has long hair and wears band T-shirts; absolutely not the sort of person you’d associate with the U.S. Marshals Service, yet there he is! (He also has his own series, good for us!). Lucas Davenport is his boss, and Lucas is big, ruthless, and very rich—and loves hunting bad guys. But what I think I’m drawn to most is that he says exactly what he thinks, gets the job done by any means possible, and does not brook fools. At all. And, as I said, I am thrilled that they’re both in this book.

So the story involves some really bad people, drug smugglers who hide their massive amounts of drugs at the bottom of the ocean and then retrieve them. They’re big time. My heart broke when the Coast Guard people who found the bad guys picking up their diver were ruthlessly murdered. The FBI could care less, so in steps Lucas and he’ll stop at nothing to get these guys. I’m just like him in that I don’t give up either, so I can relate! Lucas calls in Virgil—and I do adore that they’re so unalike, and each give as good as they get to each other whenever they both show up in the same book. In this one, Virgil is teamed up with a sassy, in-your-face woman named Rae, who’s a hoot all on her own—I have to confess, I was into her from the get-go. She conned some bad guys and I could tell loved the heck out of doing it.

Anyway, Virgil goes undercover, and I never had a moment of doubt that he’d blend right in, which was correct—he just slides into the role with his usual wit, charm, and “take what I got or don’t, doesn’t matter to me” attitude that wins the drug smugglers over so much that they want him to do the diving! I scuba dive, so I was right there watching Virgil (who didn’t know how to dive) learn everything in short order, and then go on down to the ocean’s bottom as part of his role.

Of course, they solve the case and nail the bad guys, which is always satisfying. But what I’m really attracted to in Sandford’s Prey series, are the characters. And sometimes, they’re so outrageous, and so darned cheeky I laugh out loud!

By now, you probably think I only read books by male authors who create male protagonists. Nope! Here’s a case in point. Sasscer Hill is a woman after my own heart—she writes horse racing mysteries set in the Thoroughbred racing world (!), just like me. Unlike me, Sasscer Hill was a racehorse breeder, trainer, and rider—and she brings all that experience to bear on creating an incredibly realistic setting for all her racing novels. I know a lot about Thoroughbred racing myself, so one thing I’m really drawn to in her books is how authentic they are. She does the “behind the scenes” thing with pinpoint accuracy and ease. And I love that she doesn’t shy away from the “dark underbelly” of racing, either.

In this book, her main character, Fia McKee, is on leave because she uses a little too much force when making an arrest. Ok, yeah, I love that, too. I mean, who says women can’t handle themselves in a tough profession and do what’s necessary when stuff hits the fan? That’s ok with me as long as it’s righteous, and I guess I gave Fia the benefit of the doubt. I’m always on the side of the good guys, and she definitely fits that bill.

Here, she’s asked to step in by one of the racing industry’s oversight boards, who suspects that some folks on the backstretch are illegally messing with the horses they race—as in, to my mind, given what I know, drugging the heck out of them (don’t get me started!). The Board notes that the Thoroughbreds in question are just winning a few too many races to be on the up and up. So Fia goes to live with her brother (who she has big issues with) and his daughter (who she does love) and goes undercover at the racetrack. And her daughter has a beloved horse. I have a beloved horse, and I’ve worked for many years with many beloved racehorses, so I get that, and I’m right there with the young woman when her horse gets taken. I’m up at night worried about the horse as I’m reading this novel. No kidding, I really am.

There’s a ton of nefarious stuff going on at the track with these guys, and Fia, going undercover as an exercise rider, gets into all of it—and it’s very nasty business indeed. I won’t go on and on about how much I love racehorses, but suffice it to say, the novel is unfortunately true in the depiction of what some folks will do to wonderful, spirit-filled creatures, all in the name of making a buck. You can tell it makes me furious, right?

So Fia gets into the middle of it, and I’m worried about her as the plot unfolds because if she gets caught, well, these guys are not messing around. They’re in it for big bucks, and I’m worried they’ll stop at nothing to prevent her from exposing them.

I’m drawn to Fia a lot—she’s a really strong woman and got a bad deal on her last job just because she did her job in an “old boy’s network,” or so it seems to me. And she’s smart and resourceful, and she’s able to do something I can’t. In the face of horrific treatment of horses that will, literally, do anything you ask of them (usually), she’s able to stay steely-eyed, keep her cool, not blow her cover, and bring all the bad guys to justice. Me? Let’s just say sometimes I have to channel my Fia McKee to keep my cool!

We are back in the world of horses, but this time western horses, not Thoroughbred racehorses. Laura Crum has created a series with a female equine veterinarian—Gail McCarthy—as her main character. I’m drawn to Gail because she’s incredibly competent as a vet, but also wicked smart at sniffing out the bad guys and has the courage to go against the boys very often to do just that. I’m always rooting for strong characters, men or women, and I love it that we women are now catching up in fiction as well as in real life!

This is the first in Crum’s series, but I’ve enjoyed all of them I’ve read. I love the rural setting, and I can almost smell the sweet scent of hay and hear the horses rustling gently in their stalls (which always does my heart good) as I read this book. In it, a dead horse trainer is found, and in figuring out “whodunnit,” Gail comes upon ex-girlfriends who have it out for him, unhappy rivals, and horse owners. The guy seems to have made some formidable enemies, and a whole host of them. It makes me dizzy how many bad guys this female amateur sleuth can unearth and skillfully navigate. I enjoyed how many opportunities to root for Gail that Laura Crum gave me, and how skillfully the main character wove through the many “bad guy” options—it kept me on my toes reading it!

I guess by now, it’s clear that I’m drawn to interesting, savvy characters with courage and heart, and Gail is no exception. She loves horses, which will forever endear anyone to me, and she’ll get to the bottom of any crime that, even on the edges, has to do with them. Another reason I feel right at home in her presence on the page. And . . . the other thing I relish is that I always learn something, whether it’s about the rural environment, the western horse world, or veterinary medicine and how it’s practiced. I know Thoroughbreds and Thoroughbred racing, and next to nothing about quarter horses, barrel racing, and the like. So I really love seeing this world through Gail’s eyes, not to mention being a huge fan as she bested everyone and came up with the culprit.