Ski trips can be dangerous

By Ande Jacobson

Tess Gerritsen’s eighth book in the Rizzoli & Isles series, Ice Cold, was first released in 2010. This time Gerritsen doesn’t dig into her anthropology background. Instead she uses her medical background on the living rather than the dead in this heart-stopping adventure. Reeling from her recent breakup with Father Daniel Brophy, Dr. Maura Isles attends a pathology conference in Wyoming of all places. In November. Before readers catch up with Maura’s adventure, they are first introduced to an insular community in Plain of Angels, Idaho. The compound is home to a small, religious group serving their leader, Prophet Jeremiah Goode. As is often the case in Gerritsen’s mysteries, this opening chapter from the past provides key pieces of information that will become crucial later in the story. In this look back, readers see that the prophet leads what can only be described as a cult. While the activities might jolt the hairs on the back of a reader’s neck, no specific crime is yet revealed.

The story then jumps ahead 16 years and picks up as Maura heads to the airport to travel to her conference. The conference itself is uneventful, but her reconnection with a school classmate from her undergraduate years at Stanford, Doug Comley, is the start of something that Maura will never be able to forget. Doug took a rather circuitous route since their undergraduate days, but he also eventually became a pathologist. He’s in Wyoming with his teenage daughter Grace and two close friends, Arlo and Elaine, although his three companions are neither doctors nor conference attendees. They are there for the side trips around the conference. It turns out that Doug was and still is an adventurer, and he convinces Maura to join them on a little cross-country skiing side trip. Although Maura initially isn’t sure she should go, she eventually agrees and joins them on a drive that turns into much more of an adventure than she bargained for.

The quintet, in the midst of a snow storm, gets stranded at the top of a private road when their suburban gets stuck in the snow and ultimately topples over. After giving up on their vehicle, the adventurers find their way into a deserted little village aptly named Kingdom Come, and that’s when things go from bad to deadly. The village is deserted, but in a strange way. They find a community of homes, and when they approach one they find the front door unlocked and the windows open, so they go inside. Just a few days earlier it had been unseasonably warm, but the blizzard that brought them to a halt on their ski outing makes the open windows suspicious.

The houses are all identical, and each has rugged all weather vehicles in their garages. Stranger though is that the village has no electricity, and the homes appear to have been deserted abruptly. As they explore the houses, they discover that meals are left frozen over after being served and uneaten. They also find some dead pets in some of the homes. They eventually stumble upon what appears to be some crime scenes, but without bodies, only the residue of some gory events.

They have no phone reception, no phones at all, and it’s soon clear that nobody is coming to rescue them. The next day, they borrow one of the vehicles, but as they get up the mountain toward the top of the private road they had hiked down the previous day, they get stuck. In trying to get unstuck, they suffer a tragic accident that puts Arlo in a life and death medical emergency. Good thing there are two doctors present even though they are both pathologists.

Gerritsen paints a terrifying picture of the predicament. Doug is the first to try to leave to get help, but after he doesn’t come back, Maura also tries to venture out. Eventually she finds a teenage boy named Julian Perkins and his dog Bear, although their initial meeting isn’t exactly what Maura would call friendly. Through a convoluted sequence of events, Maura determines that he’s been surviving on his own in the wilderness for some time, and while she would prefer to return to civilization, circumstances convince her that she’s better off staying with him at the moment. Over time they form a bond, and the story accelerates in unexpected directions.

This adventure is a little more disconnected than previous books, and Maura’s fate isn’t as cleanly projected other than the fact that there are additional books in the series, so it’s safe to assume that she survives despite significant challenges. Eventually, Jane Rizzoli, Gabriel Dean, Daniel Brophy, and Anthony Sansone become involved after an early false start. This is a story of corruption, childhood trauma, survival, and redemption. Not everyone in the great northwest is who they appear to be, although the identity shifts aren’t quite the same flavor as those in the previous book, The Keepsake.

Gerritsen’s resolution brings about a few surprises, and the demise of the village isn’t at all what one might suspect. She uses science to point our heroes in the right direction in the end. Gerritsen clearly did some interesting research for this story. Her incorporation of winter survival skills might have come from her familiarity with rural Maine as the winters there aren’t all that dissimilar from those in Wyoming. The forested mountains also wouldn’t be a foreign concept. There is also plenty of medical minutia sprinkled throughout the story, and it is, as is often the case when a medical examiner is the primary character in the story, forensics that gives them a push toward solving the mystery of the demise of Kingdom Come.

The story goes beyond just solving that mystery though. Julian, or “Rat” as Maura later is invited to address him, has some life changing experiences as well. Suffice it to say that this isn’t the last time readers will see this interesting young man despite his somewhat challenging beginning.

Ice Cold is the most rugged of the series to this point, and it provides more background and insight into Maura’s character. It also deepens the connection between Maura and Jane and shows how much they rely on one another in work and in life. While parts of the story are gory, those details are necessary for the story’s continuity and aren’t gratuitous. Despite some uncomfortable details, the story moves quickly, and the resolution is satisfying leaving readers comfortable knowing there will be more Rizzoli & Isles to come.

References:
The Surgeon, by Tess Gerritsen
The Apprentice, by Tess Gerritsen
The Sinner, by Tess Gerritsen
Body Double, by Tess Gerritsen
Vanish, by Tess Gerritsen
The Mephisto Club, by Tess Gerritsen
The Keepsake, by Tess Gerritsen
Ice Cold, by Tess Gerritsen
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