Lightning Strike by William Kent Krueger

Krueger’s longtime hero, Sheriff Cork O’Connor, lives way the hell up in upper Wisconsin where he deals with the locals, natives, and various out-of-towners attempting to upset the proverbial apple cart. This book is a departure. It presents some of O’Connor’s backstory (probably the first to do so, I think).

Lightning Strike takes place in one of those lazy summers when Cork was around 12. Most days are he and a couple buds biking around town and camping and canoeing in the Boundary Waters area. His dad is the Sheriff of Aurora, WI who sort of unwittingly is showing Cork the tools of the trade that will help him as an adult when he himself becomes the sheriff.

Cork and his friends canoe out for a campsite along one of the numerous nearby lakes. As they approach the site near sunset, they notice something terribly out of place. A man hanging from a tree. The evidence points to a suicide and Sheriff O’Connor tends to think so. And not just any man. A local legend around the Ojibwe peoples that most of the kids looked up to. He’d had issues with alcohol but seemed to have put that behind him. The Ojibwe people are suspicious of the Sheriff’s line of investigation despite the Sheriff being one-quarter Ojibwe.

Racial tensions percolate, most of which perplex young Cork. The Ojibwe and the whites have an uneasy truce. And within the whites, there is a noticeable gap between the haves and the have nots. Not to mention some mingling of the races and classes make seemingly dozens of possible suspects. Some rich folks want to develop the lakeshore with a swank hotel and its false promises of jobs and prosperity for all the locals. If the truth can’t be uncovered, Aurora may well explode in a long awaited civil war. Within these conflicting tensions, Cork and he pals pick at various clues trying to find out who killed their friend.

Kruegar has given us (me in particular) two of the very best novels I’ve ever read. Ordinary Grace and This Tender Land. I first stumbled across Krueger through his Cork O’Connor series and this title is his 18^th in the series, but seeing as how this is a backstory book, call this one #0 and not #18.

Krueger is a smooth and skillful writer who can speak easily across genders, ages, and ethnicities. Start with Ordinary Grace and This Tender Land, then venture into the Cork O’Connor series. A gentle hook will draw you into a mystical and mysterious land. 

 

East Coast Don