Mysterious Reviews, mysteries reviewed by the Hidden Staircase Mystery Books, has written a review of Wild Inferno by Sandi Ault. For our blog readers, we are printing it first here in advance of its publication on our website.
Wild Inferno by Sandi Ault
A Jamaica Wild Mystery
Berkley Prime Crime (Hardcover)
ISBN-10: 0-425-21922-4 (0425219224)
ISBN-13: 978-0-425-21922-5 (9780425219225)
Publication Date: February 2008
List Price: $23.95
Synopsis (from the publisher): Wildfire erupts on a patchwork of land including the Southern Ute Reservation, and BLM agent Jamaica Wild is called away from her normal duties to serve on the Incident Command Team. A cantankerous old man from the Ute tribe named Grampa Ned has reportedly snuck around barricades and entered an area to one side of the fire. Jamaica risks danger to go after him, but before she can find him, the fire crowns and torches through the area, forcing her to run for her life. As she escapes, Jamaica discovers a firefighter smoldering and wavering on the side of the road. The man, part of a hotshot crew that is trapped in the burn area, sputters a cryptic message to Jamaica before losing consciousness.
While the burned man lies comatose in a burn unit, the rest of his crew is found deep inside the black—where the fire has burned through—singed and suffering from smoke inhalation, but alive thanks to their fire shelters. The charred body of Grampa Ned is discovered nearby in the seared forest—but he has not died from the fire, but rather from a blow to the head. The FBI investigates the murder, and the agent in charge asks for Jamaica's help. The Chimney Rock Fire intensifies, threatening homes, highways, and a major power line feeding much of Southern Colorado.
Meanwhile, even as the fire threatens the high mesa on which they are encamped, a determined gathering of Puebloans, descendants of the ancient civilization that built the ruins at Chimney Rock, are doing ceremony atop the high cuesta. They refuse to evacuate because the sacred Lunar Standstill—an event that takes place every 18.6 years, when the moon rises exactly between the two spires of Chimney Rock—is about to occur. One of them is Momma Anna, Jamaica's medicine teacher from Tanoah Pueblo, who has brought Jamaica's wolf Mountain with her to Chimney Rock and into the path of danger.
Jamaica must work to ensure that the Native Americans and her beloved wolf are safe while she tries to discover what happened to both Grampa Ned and the burning man. What was Grampa Ned doing on the mountain before he was murdered—and why didn't the burning man stay with his crew? What would make them risk incineration in a wild inferno?
Review: The second mystery to feature Jamaica Wild, Wild Inferno by Sandi Ault, has the Bureau of Land Management agent traveling to Colorado to assist in battling a wildfire that has broken out on the Southern Ute Indian reservation.
Jamaica's first assignment upon arriving is to locate, and evacuate, an old Ute named Grampa Ned. Instead, she finds a badly burned firefighter whose final words before slipping into a coma are, "Save the grandmother." When Grampa Ned is later found dead, it's quickly determined that he didn't die from the fires but from a shovel to the back of the head. Now Jamaica has several puzzles on her hands: What was so important to cause Grampa Ned to rush into a firestorm, shovel in hand? Who killed him and why? And what did the downed firefighter mean when he asked her to save the grandmother?
Wild Inferno would seem to have all the elements of a terrific mystery. There's the suspenseful environment in which the story takes place (a raging and unpredictable wildfire), a murdered man (a whodunit), a mysterious plea ("save the grandmother"), and compelling characters (Jamaica herself, the Ute Indians, and in a not so minor role, Jamaica's wolf Mountain). But it is really the characters, and particularly the stories and rituals of the Utes, which make Wild Inferno a compelling novel.
With the exception of the opening and closing chapters, the wildfires aren't really a factor in the story. The whodunit aspect is also somewhat secondary; though it's mentioned that everyone hated Grampa Ned, there really aren't that many characters in the book, and most are Jamaica's colleagues, associates, or friends. With only a couple of people left, it's not too hard to figure out who killed Grampa Ned.
What's left are the characters themselves. Ault cleverly weaves a mystery plot into the tapestry that is a tale of the Ute people and their customs. At one point, in reference to a conversation with Momma Anna, a medicine woman and close friend, Jamaica says, "She spoke in riddles, gave strange instructions, and generally set me off on missions I didn't understand. As was often the case, I had absolutely no idea what she was talking about, yet I sensed she expected me to act on the information she had just imparted." The story in Wild Inferno is crafted in much the same way. It's very well done and fascinating to read.
Special thanks to Blanco and Peace for providing a copy of Wild Inferno for this review.
Review Copyright © 2008 — Hidden Staircase Mystery Books — All Rights Reserved.
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