Giles Blunt: The Delicate Storm (UK 2014)

From the Publisher:
Stylish, atmospheric psychological thriller following on from the Silver Dagger Award winner, Forty Words for Sorrow.
A gruesome discovery in the wilderness above Algonquin Bay leads detectives John Cardinal and Lisa Delorme to a remote cabin that has served as an abattoir for a cold-blooded killer...

But the woods hide other horrors and soon a second body is discovered, naked and shrouded in ice. When one of the victims is identified as an American the Mounties have to be called in, but it's the Canadian Secret Service that arouses the most mistrust. Is their interference due to a suspected terrorist link, or is there something even more sinister behind it?

With Northern Ontario in the grip of an ice storm of once-in-a-hundred years severity, the woods take on a glittering, lethal beauty. And in this winter wonderland John Cardinal must hunt down and confront a killer.

Giles Blunt: The Delicate Storm. HarperCollins, ISBN: 9780007387748 (January, 2014), eBook, 0.41 MB (ca. 480 p.), £6.99.

Giles Blunt: The Delicate Storm (USA 2004)

From the Publisher:
The award-winning author of Forty Words for Sorrow - winner of Britain's Silver Dagger Award - returns with a stunningly inventive crime thriller featuring homicide detectives John Cardinal and Lise Delorme.

Algonquin Bay, northern Ontario: A freak warm front has moved in, rousing hungry bears from hibernation -- and spurring a smart and powerful killer to commit the perfect crime... over and over again.

Giles Blunt: The Delicate Storm. Berkley Books, ISBN: 042519678X (May, 2004), 352 p., $6.99.

Giles Blunt: The Delicate Storm (UK 2004)

From the Publisher:
Stylish, atmospheric psychological thriller following on from the Silver Dagger Award winner, Forty Words for Sorrow.
A gruesome discovery in the wilderness above Algonquin Bay leads detectives John Cardinal and Lisa Delorme to a remote cabin that has served as an abattoir for a cold-blooded killer...

But the woods hide other horrors and soon a second body is discovered, naked and shrouded in ice. When one of the victims is identified as an American the Mounties have to be called in, but it's the Canadian Secret Service that arouses the most mistrust. Is their interference due to a suspected terrorist link, or is there something even more sinister behind it?

With Northern Ontario in the grip of an ice storm of once-in-a-hundred years severity, the woods take on a glittering, lethal beauty. And in this winter wonderland John Cardinal must hunt down and confront a killer.

Giles Blunt: The Delicate Storm. HarperCollins, ISBN: 0007115784 (January, 2004), 449 p., £6.99.

Giles Blunt: The Delicate Storm (UK 2003)

From the Publisher:
Stylish, atmospheric psychological police thriller featuring detectives Cardinal and Delorme
'It lay there, fishbelly white, hair curling along one side. Toward the wrist end, the flesh still bore the zigzag impression of a watch with an expandable bracelet. Even though there was no hand attached, there was no doubt that the thing lying in Ivan Bergeron's backyard was a human arm.'

The gruesome discovery in the wilderness above Algonquin Bay is assumed to be the work of bears. Until the search for body parts leads detectives Cardinal and Delorme to a remote trapper's cabin that has served as an abbattoir for a cold-blooded human predator. Until the woods give up a second body, naked and shrouded in ice.

Having narrowly survived an RCMP investigation into police corruption, John Cardinal is less than thrilled when the first victim is identified as a US citizen and the Mounties are called in to assist. It's the Canadian Secret Service, however, that pose the real problem. Is their interference in the case merely a question of preserving jurisdiction over cases involving terrorism - or something more sinister?

Even the elements seem to be conspiring against the police, with Northern Ontario in the grip of an ice storm of once-in-a-hundred-years severity. The woods take on a glittering, lethal beauty, the eerie silence broken only by the crash of falling branches and power lines. And against this backdrop Cardinal comes face to face with a killer.

Second in the series featuring John Cardinal and Lise Delorme, central characters in the widely acclaimed Forty Words for Sorrow.

Giles Blunt: The Delicate Storm. HarperCollins, ISBN: 0007115725 (July, 2003), 283 p., £17.99.

Giles Blunt: The Delicate Storm (USA 2003)

From the Publisher:
The author of Forty Words for Sorrow - winner of Britain's Silver Dagger Award - returns with a crime thriller challenging our most cherished belief: that, in fiction, there is no such thing as the perfect crime.

The small city of Algonquin Bay in northern Ontario: A freak warm front has moved in, making it feel like April and rousing hungry bears from hibernation. So when Ivan Bergeron's dog brings him the chewed-off arm of a white male, it's assumed the victim met a natural if ugly end. Except, as it turns out, the owner of the arm was dead before the bears got to him.

A second victim is found: a woman, apparently raped. There has to be a connection-two bodies abandoned in the woods within days of each other can't be a coincidence. Then police records reveal a long-unsolved murder with the same MO: a woman found in the woods, seemingly raped. It isn't long before homicide detectives Delorme and Cardinal are led back thirty years to another unsolved murder, this one linked to Quebec terrorists. Logic suggests the Algonquin Bay murders are connected to this case. Evidence is less convincing. And somewhere, a murderer-smart and powerful-is walking free.

Giles Blunt: The Delicate Storm. Marian Wood / Putnam's, ISBN: 0399148655 (June, 2003), 301 p., $24.95.