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Book Review By Bobby Blades
Cold Day In Paradise by Steve Hamilton

In the first of Steve Hamilton's Alex McKnight mystery series, Cold Day In Paradise develops the character of Alex McKnight as he moves to Paradise, Michigan to run a hunting camp built by his late father. The story gets rolling when Edwin Fulton, the son of a wealthy Detroit family and a compulsive gambler, calls Alex from a motel where he has found the murdered body of his bookie. After McKnight is pursuaded to become a private investigator he is hired by Fulton's mother to watch the family when another bookie is murdered. This then prompts a local lawyer and McKnight to search for Edwin on their own. It's around this time that McKnight starts getting mysterious notes, phones calls, and roses left at his residence. It seems like the man who killed his partner while he was a police officer in Detroit is back to haunt McKnight.


Plot & Themes
Tone of story - suspenseful (sophisticated fear)
How difficult to spot villain? - Challenging
Time/era of story:
Misc. Murder Plotlets - local police w/ IQ of a houseplant - killer purposefully leaves puzzle clues
What % of story relates directly to the mystery, not the subplot? - 50%
Special suspect? - chronically deranged person
Murder of certain profession?
Kind of investigator
Kid or adult book? - Adult or Young Adult Book
Any non-mystery subplot?
descript. of violence and chases - 30 %
Planning/preparing, gather info, debate puzzles/motives - 30 %
Feelings, relationships, character bio/development - 30 %
How society works & physical descript. (people, objects, places) - 10 %
Crime Thriller Yes
Murder Mystery (killer unknown) Yes

Main Character
Gender - Male
Profession/status:
Age: - 40's-50's
Ethnicity/Race

Main Adversary
Identity: - Male
Motive of antagonist - insanity

Setting
United States Yes
The US: - Midwest

Writing Style
Accounts of torture and death? - very gorey descriptions deaths/dead bodies
Unusual forms of death - perforation--bullets
Unusual form of death? Yes
Amount of dialog - roughly even amounts of descript and dialog
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