Customer Reviews

A Long December

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Donald Harstad writes an incredibly good police procedural. I'm not even a fan of the genre and yet I am hooked on this series! Carl Houseman, deputy sheriff and senior investigator for Nation County, Iowa, is called to the Heinman farm to investigate a dead body. The dead body, Rudy Cueva, worked at a local kosher meat packing plant in Battenberg and was shot at close range. Soon, another body is found, Juan Gonzalez aka Orejas, only he wasn't shot. Instead, he ingested the deadly toxin ricin and what has appeared to be a drug deal gone bad now has turned into a federal case involving terrorism. Meanwhile, people in New York are dying from ricin due to purchasing products connected to the Battenberg plant. All the usual characters from this series are present, including Iowa DCI agent Hester Gorse and the dispatcher, Sally. The book actually begins with the finale where Carl, Hester, Sally, and George are holed up in a barn, outgunned and outmanned. Harstad alternates chapters with the investigation from the beginning and scenes from the barn until reaching the final, dramatic conclusion of the novel. At first, I found this confusing but soon I realized that this actually added to the story. I eagerly await Harstad's next Carl Houseman novel!

Carl Houseman is the deputy sheriff of Nation County, Iowa, and the laconic narrator of Donald Harstad's new thriller, "A Long December." Carl is also the department's senior investigator, and it is his job to figure out who shot an unidentified male, execution style, in a remote area called Frog Hollow. Was this death related to a drug deal gone sour? Working along with Iowa DCI agent Hester Gorse, Houseman finds out that this crime is just the tip of a very dangerous iceberg that may have national implications.

The main characters in "A Long December" are a likable bunch, and they have a matter-of-fact and businesslike attitude towards danger. Their dry humor and amiable camaraderie make them very easy to take. It is also refreshing to read a crime thriller that takes places in the nation's heartland rather than in a major metropolitan area.

One irritating aspect of this book, however, is the repeated shifting back and forth in time between a gun battle and the events that led up to the shootout. This dizzying flashback device is a needless annoyance that serves no dramatic purpose. Harstad would have done better in this case to have Houseman tell his story in a more linear manner.

Still, "A Long December" has much to recommend it. It raises some timely themes about our dangerous world and the men and women who risk their lives to defend us. The plot is complex and engrossing and the author provides some fascinating information about how investigations are conducted. It may not be flashy or glitzy, but "A Long December" gets the job done.

I was an early fan of Harstad's series (he's a real-life lawman in NE Iowa), but he's facing the same problem as Archer Mayor, another real-life rural cop -- how in the heck do you write a series set in a place where, in real life, nothing much ever happens beyond domestic violence and drunk & disorderly?

For the most part, Mayor has concentrated on local color and a drawing a fine and very accurate portrait of low-life milltown New England. His mayhem has mostly remained realistic -- crooked real estate developers, out-of-control drug dealers, etc.

Harstad, on the other hand, has opted for extra-crunchy police procedure (one volume even has a glossary of 10-codes) and an ever escalating collection of improbable "hell comes to Ioway" scenarios. I won't give away anything, but let's just say this one is very post-9/11. I can't imagine how he'll top himself unless the next novel contains a Martian invasion.

The emphasis on bigger and better catastrophes has sorta moved the series halfway between police procedural and thriller. I still like them just fine, and Harstad remains an excellent writer, but I kinda wish he'd stopped at the "mysterious Satanic cult invades Iowa" level of improbability.

Other than that, the series remains quite consistent, including the fact that each story finds office Houseman barely coming home to sleep, and that his wife is encountered largely through notes she leaves on the fridge. The cast of continuing characters is still here, including "George of the Bureau" and the formidable dispatcher Sally, and Harstad still has a keen and funny eye for the absurdities of organizational politics.

I have read all of the books in this series and they seem to just get better. It is refreshing to read a story set in the midwest where things are a little more laid back than in the big cities. Mr. Harstad has created several interesting characters and continues to develop them in each story. I especially like the fact that the male and female officers can work together in these stories without having a romantic attraction. It is just about cops doing their job and in Nation county they do it well.

Where is Harstads new book? It was due to be released Jan 2005, and is not availble. The publisher changed and everything went downhill from there. Is Donald dead or what? Does anyone know what is going on in Elkader,Iowa?

I've loved every book in this series. Low-key wit, intelligent humor, tight writing that gets better with each outing, an insider's glimpse at how Things Really Work.

The only thing I find myself wishing for is more from Mrs. Houseman's (Sue's) perspective. Does she have to remain a nonentity? Or like Mrs. Columbo, does it just work best that way? hmmmm...

Although not the best of his books, the author delivers a good read. Not nearly as many police proceedurals as his other books, but it is interesting how he interweaves all the Law Enforcement Agencies, local, state and federal into one purpose. I hope since 9/11 this is the way our agencies cooperate, but I remain skeptical after being a police officer for 13 years and an army investigator for 8 years. Anyway, if you enjoyed his first four books in the series you should like this book.

Of course deputy/investigator Houseman retains his sardonic wit, spoken and unspoken. Most of the other characters from the first four books all find their way into this novel. Add a small bunch of pathetic terrorists and small time crooks and you have a Harstad standard book. You betcha!!!

Harstad just keeps getting better and better. "A Long December" is a gripping story with explosive action that will shakes the dust off your rafters! If he weren't so good writing crime-stories, Harstad could probably give humorist Dave Barry a run for his money. Those who like stories that are crazy enough to be believable; those who like the idiosyncracies of small-town and rural life; and those who like looking at the world through the eyes of people who have to lay it on the line, you'll enjoy this one immensely. Every one of Harstad's books leaves me eager to read his next one!

Once again I am delighted with this author's unpretentious engagement that draws me into the life of a small county law enforcement agency policing amidst the corn fields and pig pens of rural Iowa. This story is technically trickier than previous Carl Houseman stories, and Harstad pulls it off masterfully. Half the action takes place during a siege in which the main character, chief investigator Houseman, and his law enforcement buddies are trapped in an old barn by automatic fire from unknown assailants. Interspersed with the siege story, the other half takes place in the days leading up to the siege. The basic plot answers the question, How does the execution murder of a small time Latino hustler with dubious drug involvement tie into an international plot to poison and kill thousands, starting with the Jewish patrons of a kosher meat packing plant in rural Iowa? I don't know what engages me more -- the tightly constructed, thoroughly believable trail of clues leading inexorably to the yet unexpected resolution, or the equally addicting wry, dry, self-deprecating and witty observations of investigator Houseman. I found myself chuckling out loud at his various droll comments, like when he was in the emergency room, trying to avoid being interviewed by the press, and finally deciding that trying to climb through the rest room's small window would only result in bigger press coverage of an aging, stocky law man stuffed half in and half out of a bathroom window. Houseman's humor brings a completely believable authenticity to law enforcement activity that is too often presented as mysterious and miraculous. What other mystery novelists would think to let us in on the true secrets of a good stakeout -- lots of good food and a battery operated heater? I laughed out loud at the picture of the four member team in multi-layered winter clothing struggling up the farmyard drive with multiple rifles, shotguns, sidearms, and ammunition -- and a bright red cooler full of "hot coffee, water, and sandwiches, and pop, and string cheese, and pretzels, and trail mix, and tea . . . " (258). And don't forget the thermos of minestrone and the Girl Scout cookies! I have two lists of favorite mystery writers -- those I pick up when they come out in paperback, and those that are worth first edition hardcovers. Harstad is absolutely on my first edition list!

I am a big fan of Donald Harstad. This book is of even more interest because it takes place in the fictional town of Battenberg, clearly patterned after Postville, Iowa, not far from where I live in NW, Illinois. Postville was the subject of two very interesting books* about the economic rise and downfall of a town that became a microcosm of problems wit immigration in the United States.

Prior to 1987 the town had been mostly German and Norwegian, basically your standard homogeneous farming community in the Midwest. It was in slow decline as are most towns in this area. Then a group of Hasidim Jews from New York purchased an old meat-packing plant, fixed it up and made it kosher. They were soon shipping kosher meat all over the United States, the plant became the largest of its kind in the world, and the community began to thrive, but was accompanied by the usual discomfiture of many Spanish-speaking (not Mexican Spanish, but Honduran and Guatemalan Spanish which made it difficult for the police to learn the language aside from financial issues,) workers mixing with the more staid farmers. In addition there were the religious differences. All well and good and Stephen Bloom wrote a book which became a Frontline TV special about how diversity was working in a small Iowa community. The town began to thrive.

Then in 2008 the black-shirted Sicherheitsdienst, otherwise known as the INS and ICE, raided the factory, locked up many of the workers, placed their children, most of whom had been born in the United States, in foster care, and arrested the manager of the plant. It has since been shut down and the community has begun a slow descent back into decline.

This then forms the backdrop for Harstad's book which was written in 2003, before the shutdown of the plant, when many illegal immigrants were being imported into the community to staff the plant.

A couple of farmers witness the shooting of a fleeing man on a gravel road near their farm. Then another man is found dead in an apartment. Their only link seems to be the kosher meat-packing plant in near by Battenberg. Then they discover the dead man did not die of natural causes, but had ingested ricin. Soon the county becomes a busy place indeed. "There were people representing the FBI, DOJ, CDC, FDA, DEA, ATF, OSHA, as well as the EMD. I felt like I was watching CNN."

A recurrent theme in Harstad's books is the respect he has for local law enforcement and disdain for the inter-agency bickering and power-pissing contests that hinder the local focus on a crime. The federal agencies do have the resources, however, so cooperation is always essential if not required.

The plot is the least important element in Harstad's books. The recurring characters, Sally, Carl, Hester. Lamar, and peripherally Volont, and George, become so real and likeable, that the reader wishes he could meet them all over dinner somewhere just to watch the often comic interplay among them.

*Books referenced:

Postville: A Clash of Cultures in Heartland America
Postville: USA: Surviving Diversity in Small-Town America