Starvation Lake-Bryan Gruley

Starvation Lake
Bryan Gruley
Touchstone, Mar 3 2009, $$14.00
ISBN: 9781416563624

In Starvation Lake, Michigan everyone is shook up when pieces of a snowmobile wash ashore at Lake Walleye. Sheriff Dingus Aho puts a close hold on the investigation, but rumors spread that the snowmobile is the one driven by legendary peewee ice hockey coach Jack Blackburn who died ten years while riding one at Starvation Lake.

Thirty-four years old Gus Carpenter, the editor of the local paper Pilot, and his ace reporter Joanne McCarthy makes inquires into the current case, which leads back to what happened to the coach in 1998. Their investigation leads to a decade earlier when Gus as a goalie let in the winning shot in the State Championship and back to the 1970sd when Coach worked with kids in Canada. However, Gus has legal issues involving an unidentified source back when he worked in Detroit that has him somewhat distracted as he knows the family oriented Pilot may be his last stop on the way back down the same ladder he had climbed up.

Although there are too many references to the lost hockey game that allegedly destroyed the town especially by an odious participant turned builder who belongs in the penalty box, fans of sports mysteries will enjoy this fun investigative thriller. The story line is driven by the townsfolk as everyone seems to have secrets even the hero’s widow mom. Gus is a terrific lead character who holds his anger in check as no one will let him forget the goal that changed Lake Salvation. Joanne reminds him of himself when he was on the way up until he learned at the Detroit Times how in bed the media and the corporations are. Bryan Gruley provides a winning goal that places the small-town hockey atmosphere of Mystery, Alaska inside a Michigan mystery.
Harriet Klausner