The Beautiful Mystery, by Louise Penny

I love Louise Penny's books, but wish she could resist the compulsion to torment the characters I've grown so fond of.  In The Beautiful Mystery, Gamache and Beauvoir are summoned to an isolated monastery to investigate the murder of a monk.  The Gilbertine monks are masters of the Gregorian chant and have been in hiding since the Inquisition.  Eighteen months previously they released a recording of the chants to the world and their quiet isolation is now being threatened from within and without.

A Door in the River, by Inger Ash Wolfe

Wolfe is a ferociously skilled writer, and his creation Hazel Micallef is one of my favorite fictional characters.  Micallef is a Detective Inspector in a small town in Ontario.  She is investigating a series of attacks taking place on or near a First Nations reserve, while dealing with provincial police politics, an ailing mother, tribal police, and the uncertain future of her county.  Plotting, dialogue, pacing and relationships are peerless, and humor, heart and tension are employed in perfect balance.

A Killing Winter, by Wayne Arthurson

Leo Deroches teetered on the brink of destruction throughout Fall from Grace, but in A Killing Winter, he falls and continues to fall to the end.  I don't have first-hand knowledge, but I think what Arthurson has to say about gambling addiction is true.  The book is also about native gangs, native politics, and tribal land development in Alberta.  It's hard to imagine Leo coming back for more self-abuse, but Arthurson calls it a series.  One can but hope.

A Criminal to Remember, by Michael Van Rooy

I think this was Van Rooy's last book before his heart attack and death in January.  The book has two parallel tracks:  On the cynical track, Monty is recruited to run for president of the civilian police oversight board by people who plan to use him to defeat their serious opponent, and on the creepy track Clare is stalked by a serial killer called the Shy Man, and Monty must protect her and their son Fred.  The writing and plotting are both clever, and the ending grisly.  I'll miss this series; there's something sad I can't pinpoint about having a signed copy of the book.

A Trick of the Light, by Louise Penny

The mystery concerns the murder of a recovering alcoholic in Clara's garden.  The meditations are about hope (it is essential), addiction (it destroys everything and everyone in its path), the ability of people to change (not often, not fundamentally, not always for the better), and forgiveness (its healing power is stronger for the person who forgives than the person who is forgiven).  The question that lingers most strongly in my mind is how to apply these lessons to Jean-Guy's addiction to pain-killers and Clara and Peter's shattered marriage.  The next book will provide answers, hopefully, in a way less sad than the way the questions came to be posed.

An Ordinary Decent Criminal, by Michael Van Rooy

This is the book that introduced ex-criminal Monty Haaviko and his wife Claire, and Monty's efforts to turn away from his criminal and drug addicted past -- a little.  He's shown getting his first-ever non-felonious job, and making and abiding by the conscious choice to turn away from drugs, alcohol, and crime every single day. After a home invasion attempt, during which Monty kills the invaders, he becomes the moving target of the police, the gang boss who sent the home invaders, and his neighbors.  The book offers a crash course in booby trapping one's back yard, creating a lock pick from an electric toothbrush, and making the most revolting sounding barbeque sauce in the world.  Fast, entertaining, and a bit creepy.  There's a movie by the same name, but not based on the book.

Your Friendly Neighborhood Criminal, by Michael Van Rooy

Montgomery Haaviko is such a guilty pleasure.  His banter with his wife Claire is very clever, his role as babysitter for a handful of neighborhood toddlers is endearing, his unbridled willingness to bring all guns (as well as fire hoses, arrows, box cutters, booby traps, etc.) to bear on anyone threatening his family or neighborhood is chilling.  His efforts to go straight-ish are entertaining and a bit heroic.  In this, Van Rooy's second book, Monty takes a job building an underground railroad for smuggling people into and out of Canada for the good guys.  Unfortunately, the railroad is seen as a perfect smuggling route for the bad guys who decide to take it over.  Monty takes care of the bad guys in a thorough and violent way.  Van Rooy died in January 2011. 

Fall From Grace, by Wayne Arthurson

Sure, we all like our heros flawed, but Leo Desroches is pushing things.  A half-Cree/half-French-Canadian gambling addict who lost his family, job, and self-respect to the addiction, Deroches is making slow progress toward reestablishing himself as a journalist and father.  He holds the gambling addiction at bay with drugs and ... bank robberies.  Yes, that's right.  I thought maybe they had changed the point of view when Desroches politely robbed his first bank.  Really, Mr. Arthurson?  The mystery revolves around a string of deaths of Native prostitutes in Edmonton, Alberta, that the police are unwilling to view as the work of a serial killer despite the similarities.  It appears to be quite chilly in Edmonton in the winter.

The Calling, Inger Ash Wolfe

I love the characters in this book, Hazel Micallef, the 61-year-old police chief of a small rural town in Ontario, her mom, Emily, and her co-workers, including James Wingate.  I was even kind of fond of the serial killer.  Hazel is smart and driven, a little sad about her failed marriage and distant children, and very human.  The serial killer offers terminally ill people a peaceful way to die, but then he mutilates their bodies in some pretty grisly ways.  I'll keep an eye out for the pseudonymous Wolfe.

Bury Your Dead, by Louise Penny

Louise Penny just keeps getting better and better.  She gets a little more ambitious with each book, but so far hasn't put a foot wrong.  Multiple things are going on here -- Gamache and Beauvoir are recovering from mental and physical wounds received in an attack on a terrorist stronghold.  While doing so, Gamache assists the Quebec City police in solving the murder of an amateur archeologist obsessed with finding the grave of Samuel de Champlain; Beauvoir goes to Three Pines to reopen the hermit case.  The three stories unfold bit by bit, with information and guesses on Quebec history woven in.  The audio throws in an interview with Louise Penny, a lovely person it appears.  Ralph Coshom is such an amazing reader it's hard to imagine reading Penny without his voices in my head.