Customer Reviews

A Cold Blooded Business

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This is an exciting, suspenseful and atmospheric mystery set in Alaska. Aleut investigator Kate Shugak goes undercover working on the pipeline for an oil company to find out who's supplying cocaine to its employees. I could have done with a little less detail on the processes involved in oil extraction, but there's a lot to enjoy here. Much of Kate's first day at the base camp is quite funny, and there are enough colorful, eccentric people to satisfy anyone. I enjoyed the interlude in Anchorage with Kate and her wolf-Siberian husky mix, Mutt, one of those dogs you find in mysteries who obviously have more sense than some of the human characters. The identity of one of the drug dealers really surprised me. Not only is this a good, entertaining story; it's also true to life in showing, as Kate points out, how drugs can make smart people stupid and greedy.

It is such a pleasure to read these early entries in the wonderful Kate Shugak series, and to get to know our main character book by book.

In this fourth book in the series, Kate, working undercover to find the source of a mighty cocaine habit among workers on the Pipeline (unnamed, but obviously a conglomerate of existing pipeline behemoths), hires on as a roustabout in Alaska's Far North. Knowing that her very presence at the oil company's home base will offend her formidable grandmother for all time, Kate nevertheless quickly gets used to the work, the comraderie--and most of all, the nonstop food, akin to a cruise ship. Between gorging herself on luscious steaks, homemade fries and all-you-can-eat ice cream sundaes, Kate begins to sense the evil and dangerous drug busines that lurks beneath the surface.

With some much-needed "down time" with lover Jack and wonder dog Mutt (half huskie, half wolf) to clear her head, Kate uncovers a plot that threatens to undermine not only the giant oil company, but her very life as well.

Fun, fast read...absolutely delightful.

When I grow up I want to be Kate Shugak. I want to be fiercely independant, pretty, strong and intelligent. I want to work for money when I need it at the jobs I choose. I want to be able to live off the land and live in the middle of nowhere. I want a beautiful fierce dog at my side. I want the relationships in my life to be by their own rules. I want to live an unboring life of excitement, whether it's dangerous or peaceful. Never mind that Kate is two years younger than I am now, I want to be her when I grow up!

A COLD-BLOODED BUSINESS by Dana Stabenow may be the weakest story in the Kate Shugak series. The discovery of oil brought more people to Alaska than the Gold Rush, but the crooks must vie with the homesteaders to make a life in the frozen north. As always Ms. Stabenow provides the exact details to open the doors for the reader to the promise land. With A COLD-BLOODED BUSINESS, those details have intruded on the story telling.
Drugs and stolen native grave tokens vie for the front seat in a land where there is no margin for error. It is a little plodding, but still a good read for Kate's fans.
Nash Black, author whose books are also available in Kindle editions.
Writing as a Small BusinessSins of the Fathers: A Brewster County NovelNatchez Above The River: A Family's Survival In The Civil War

I got one of these books somehow and then went shopping to find the whole series. Bought some of them used since that is the only way to get them but you can see how much I liked the series. I am going to give them all to my local school library after I finish them. They will make great books for the teens and the teachers to enjoy. Lots of action, information about the Alaska lifestyle and the various groups living there, and writing that keeps your interest from start to finish.

COLD-BLOODED BUSINESS smokes. Dana Stabenow is a terrific mystery writer, and this novel is a smoking good mystery. Kate Shugak, a strong native Alaskan superwoman, is in prime form here. She goes undercover as an oilfield roustabout to investigate drug smuggling. Stabenow describes her frigid Alaskan setting with perfection. I love her characters--the good ones as well as the evil ones. Even the ones in-between. COLD-BLOODED BUSINESS is an awesome book.

COLD-BLOODED BUSINESS smokes. Dana Stabenow is a terrific mystery writer, and this novel is a smoking good mystery. Kate Shugak, a strong native Alaskan superwoman, is in prime form here. She goes undercover as an oilfield roustabout to investigate drug smuggling. Stabenow describes her frigid Alaskan setting with perfection. I love her characters--the good ones as well as the evil ones. Even the ones in-between. COLD-BLOODED BUSINESS is an awesome book.

I'm not an aficionado of mysteries. I make three exceptions: Robert P. Parker, Kathy Brandt, and Dana Stabenow. Stabenow, like Brandt, makes excellent use of her locations. Alaska is basically a character in each tale of sleuth Kate Shugak. Stabenow has a knack for drawing the reader into a different part of the Alaskan realm in each book, while keeping us interested in Kate's life, loves, and perils. This is another fast, enchanting read by a master of her craft.

Matt Bille
author
www.mattwriter.com

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Kate Shugak, a former investigator for the Anchorage DA, now lives on her
homestead near Niniltna and the Quilak range, near the Canadian border
east of Anchorage. Kate is an Aleut, the first in her family to go to college.
A major part of the charm of the series is the meeting of the Native and
white cultures. And Ms. Stabenow is a crackerjack storyteller.

The series is up to #14 now. It's not critical where you start - I've yet to read a
poor one. My favorite, "A Cold-Blooded Business" (1994), takes Ms. Shugak
to the North Slope oilfields. Ms. Stabenow spent 6 yrs working on the Slope
and it shows. Kate's new boss Toni is evicting a couple of entrepeneurs
from the camp:


'After a moment the door cracked. A large, round blue eye peered out. It
encountered Toni and paused. There was a long sigh, and the door opened
further, to expose a six-foot platinum blonde in a minuscule leather cowboy
vest... There was a lot more breast than there was vest. Kate sternly
repressed what she assured herself was merely a momentary feeling of
inadequacy...

A gentleman was just rising from the bed, buckling his jeans. "Why, Bob",
Toni cooed. "I haven't seen you in ages. Where've you been keeping
yourself?"

"Up yours, Hartzler", he snarled.

"Oh, goodness me, did I knock a moment too soon?" Toni wondered aloud.
Belle and Jane both giggled as he snarled again and shouldered Kate aside on
his way out.'


I started on Ms. Stabenow's mysteries after reading, and liking, her
"Star" science-fiction series - "Handfull of Stars", "Second Star" & "Red
Planet Run" - good space-operas all, light-hearted and fun. In part these are
the Klondike gold rush transposed to the asteroids - better done than most
such, and clearly written by someone who knows some mining history. Ms.
Stabenow passes a reality check in an area I know well, and thus gains
credibility for other background material.

In short, Dana Stabenow is a fine, conscientious writer and a helluva
storyteller. Highly recommended.

Review copyright 1998 by Peter D. Tillman

Aleut detective Kate Shugak, formerly a gifted investigator for the Anchorage D.A.'s office, moved back to Alaska's far north country after a horrible child abuse case left her scarred physically and emotionally. She now resides on a 160-acre homestead with her half-wolf, half-husky, half-breed canine named Mutt and makes her living as a private investigator. In "A Cold-Blooded Business," the business refers to cocaine and stolen antiquities, an unexpected added attraction.

John King, CEO of the Alaska Division of Royal Petroleum Company, hires Kate for $1000. per day, plus expenses, to discover who is importing wholesale drugs into the Base Camp and Operating Area at Prudhoe Bay and retailing the product to his employees. His internal security has been unable to halt the cocaine infiltration. The use of these drugs has resulted in lethal accidents and could potentially cause a major shut down of the Trans-Alaska pipeline, killing many people in the process. Kate goes undercover as a roustabout, an entry level position assigned the "dirty work," from chauffeuring to picking-up garbage.

Ms. Shugak, a Native American and environmentalist, finds herself appreciating the luxuries the oil company offers and almost hates herself for it. Employees are provided with gourmet meals, steak twice a week and prime ribs on Sunday, pool facilities, sauna, exercise room, etc., and congenial company. She is disturbed by how easily she grows accustomed to these "perks." A relative loner, Kate finds herself liking many of her co-workers, even her prime suspects. But the play is fouler than she ever imagined, involving the theft of ancient artifacts from sacred graves, as well as massive drug dealing and using, terrible greed and murder...perhaps even her own.

Kate's lover and former colleague Jack Morgan and her grandmother, Ekaterina Moonin, two terrific characters, appear in this novel. Grandma is not happy when she discovers that her own flesh and blood has gone to work for big oil!

Dana Stabenow won an Edgar Award for the series' debut mystery "A Cold Day for Murder." Her Kate Shugak novels are consistently good to excellent, and one of the reasons I enjoy them so much is their Arctic setting and the details of native life and culture. The author's descriptions of the region's physical geography are wonderful. And Kate Shugak is super savvy, tough, prickly, and vulnerable, although she hides it well. She has a deep loyalty and abiding love for her people and the land.

A terrific read and a winning sleuth series!
JANA