Blown by the Same Wind

Starred review from September 26, 2022
It’s 1968 in Straley’s excellent fourth novel set in Cold Storage, Alaska (after 2020’s What’s Time to a Pig?), and the remote fishing community deals with an influx of outsiders, including real-life poet and peace activist Thomas Merton, the Trappist monk, on leave from his abbey as a result of his antiwar activities; a pair of bigoted sport fishermen; and Boston Corbett, a bumbling FBI agent who has personal reasons for coming to Cold Storage. As the visitors mix with the locals, notably bar owner Ellie Hobbes, questions rise, among them: who’s responsible for the town’s recent series of petty burglaries and thefts? and why are the two sport fishermen suddenly interested in a mummified corpse known as the Old General stored in the bar’s root cellar? Serious crime, when it finally arrives, does so with unexpected violence in the form of murder, hostage taking, and a riveting sea chase during a storm. Readers looking for action will be amply rewarded, but the book’s main appeal lies in the vividly drawn characters and the author’s enchanting descriptions of the Alaskan outdoors. This thoughtful look at the politics and culture of a bygone era should win Straley new fans. Agent: Kerry D’Agostino, Curtis Brown.

October 1, 2022
Think nothing could possibly make Cold Storage, Alaska, any goofier? Think again. The summer of 1968 brings five new arrivals to the little fishing village. The first is a rash of burglaries--nothing too serious but more than a nuisance and well outside the competence of George Hanson, the Seattle cop who followed barkeeper Ellie Hobbes and boat keeper Slippery Wilson to Cold Storage and settled there as an unofficial lawman. The second is Brother Louis, a Trappist monk sent forth from Gethsemane, Kentucky, to dim the publicity his Cistercian monastery has gained from the books he's published as Thomas Merton. The third is FBI agent, or maybe ex-agent, Boston Corbett, who's traveled there to have a word with Brother Louis about his possible Communist sympathies. The fourth and fifth are George Atzerodt and Ed Spangler, a pair of racist agitators bent on recruiting equally weak-minded souls to their visionary cause and acquiring the Old General, a mummy Ellie grew up with back in the Haywood Saloon. Word on the streets is that the Old General's remains are actually those of actor/assassin John Wilkes Booth, and the insurrectionists think they'd be an inspiration to the followers they hope to enlist. It's hard for the Cold Storage natives to keep up with this many star-crossed arrivals, but Straley assigns a memorable role to Venus Myrtle, a 16-year-old who inspires mystical dreams in Brother Louis and straight-up lust in the sons of the Confederacy. Fans of this loopy series, licking their lips in anticipation of the ensuing complications, won't expect everything to be tied up in a neat bundle, and it isn't. Resonant 1968 memories, racist conspiracies, Zen-like mysticism, and the reliably off-kilter takes of the regulars. Perfect.

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December 1, 2022

Straley's fourth "Cold Storage" novel (following What Is Time to a Pig?) reads like a cross between historical fiction and mystery, with a dose of off-the-wall weirdness thrown in for good measure. Brother Lewis, a Trappist monk, author, and accused communist sympathizer, comes to Cold Storage, AK, in the late 1960s under a cloud of suspicion. A series of break-ins also lie at the heart of the novel's many disconnected mysteries. The author spends the first five chapters setting the scene, and the exceedingly slow pace could dissuade readers. Straley doesn't give enough attention to the many historical events included in the story. The atrocities of the Vietnam War, Martin Luther King Jr's assassination, the Red Scare, among other real-life events, are covered in just over 200 pages. Ultimately, the suspense picks up in the second half and ends with an abrupt but satisfying conclusion. VERDICT This book could serve as a stand-alone novel, but readers who enjoyed the first three novels in the series will like catching up with Ellie, Slip, and the other unusual characters in Cold Storage.--Jenny Shonk

Copyright 2022 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Starred review from November 1, 2022
Welcome to Cold Storage, Alaska. If you haven't been here before (this is the fourth book in the series), you need to know that Cold Storage is a small, remote fishing village where weird things happen--like the stranger who wanders into town calling himself Brother Louis. He appears to be a monk, but more than that, he just might be famous author (and monk) Thomas Merton traveling incognito. The new novel from the author of the Cecil Younger mystery series is set in 1968, a few months before Merton's death, and it's just terrific. Brother Louis' arrival is the first in a series of curious arrivals: other outsiders start showing up, perhaps disciples of Louis-who-might-be-Merton, and an FBI agent appears whose apparent incompetence could be an act to distract from his real mission. The outsiders are a hot topic among the regulars at Ellie's bar, but so is the Vietnam War, which has reached its tentacles even to Cold Storage. Like the earlier novels in the series, this one is funny and quirky, a lighter change of pace from the Younger books and a delight for fans of small-town comic mysteries with a bit of bite.

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