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Blood Is the Sky: An Alex McKnight Mystery | 
| Author: Steve Hamilton
Publisher: St. Martin's Minotaur
Category: Book
List Price: $21.95
Buy Used: $0.22
You Save: $21.73 (99%)
New (8) Used (44) Collectible (4) from $0.22
Avg. Customer Rating:  30 reviews
Sales Rank: 437414
Media: Hardcover
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 304
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.3
Dimensions (in): 9.5 x 6.4 x 1.1
ISBN: 0312301154
Dewey Decimal Number: 813.54
EAN: 9780312301156
ASIN: 0312301154
Publication Date: June 24, 2003
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Shipping: Expedited shipping available
Condition: few bent corners Used - Good Default Text
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Amazon.com Review
One of the most promising secondary figures in Steve Hamilton's series about reluctant northern Michigan PI Alex McKnight has always been his teetotaling Ojibwa Indian pal, Vinnie LeBlanc. But Vinnie remained mostly to himself through the first four McKnight adventures. Blood Is the Sky finally lets him loose, and it's both a pleasure and painful to see what results. Vinnie's younger, ex-con brother, Tom, has disappeared. In violation of his parole, Tom had guided a small contingent of moose hunters into the pacific forests of Ontario, but none of them had returned home on schedule. To assuage Vinnie's worries, McKnight agrees to drive with him into Canada and look for the men. No luck; the owners of a money-losing lakeside lodge where those sportsmen had stayed say they departed days ago. So where did they go? Who were the two other, unidentified guys who came looking for them in advance of McKnight and his friend? And why was the hunters' vehicle abandoned, with their wallets inside, near an Indian reservation? Looking for answers, the detective and Vinnie set off into the woods, where hungry bears are by no means the most dangerous creatures they'll have to face. Despite its Deliverance-like moments, and an explosively violent conclusion that's not sufficiently foreshadowed, Blood Is the Sky is really a gracefully composed study of character, as focused on Vinnie's strengths and failings as Hamilton's previous novel, North of Nowhere, was on the backstory of another series regular, bar owner Jackie Connery. Yet McKnight shines here, too, his self-effacing humor keeping readers amused, when they aren't amazed--again--by the lengths to which this supposedly lonerish sleuth will go to help a friend in trouble. --J. Kingston Pierce
Product Description
"When a fire is done, what’s left is only half-destroyed. It is charred and brittle. It is obscene. There is nothing so ugly in all the world as what a fire leaves behind, covered in ashes and smoke and a smell you’ll think about every day for the rest of your life."
Steve Hamilton is one of crime fiction’s rising stars. His first novel, A Cold Day in Paradise, won the Edgar Award, and each successive novel has met with widespread critical acclaim. Now Hamilton raises the stakes dramatically in his most accomplished work to date.
Reluctant investigator Alex McKnight finds himself drawn by friendship into a long drive north. The brother of Alex’s longtime Ojibwa friend Vinnie LeBlanc works as a hunting guide, serving the rich clients from downstate. It seems that Vinnie’s brother and his most recent group of hunters have vanished in northern Ontario, and Vinnie is scared enough to ask Alex to help him find them.
Their arrival sets in motion a heart-pounding string of events that leaves Alex and his friend miles from civilization, stranded in the heart of the Canadian wilderness with no food, no weapons---and no way out. And there’s someone out there who definitely does not want them to make it back alive.
At once elegant and enormously suspenseful, Steve Hamilton’s Blood Is the Sky heralds his arrival as one of the premier crime writers working today.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 25 more reviews...
 Best of the series so far August 27, 2008
I found this to be the best of the series that I have read so far. I still have the two most recently published to read. Thankfully Mcknight has stopped being so morose as he was in previous books. His self pity and whining gets a little old after a few books.
Like all of Hamiltons books, the mystery isn't solved until the last few chapters and then we get some totally new info popping up that clears everything up. In this case it was the fire that killed some kids many years before. This was info unknown for the entire book. Mcknight of course didn't look for the common thread because he was too busy driving back and forth from remote Ontario to MI and getting bailed out of jail.
But that's Mcknights character. He ain't the brightest sleuth out there as we know from past books.
In all I recommend this one.
 The Lone Catcher and Tinto June 17, 2008
Maybe I'm becoming too PC, but having listened to this book, I found the idea that McKnight was better at surviving in the woods then his friend Vinny who is a full blooded Ojibwe (and professional guide) to be just a little hard to swallow. At a couple of points in the story when they are lost up in the Canadian wilderness, Vinny is about to give up the ghost but Alex keeps pluggin' along. Boy, I wouldn't want to be stuck on a hunting trip with Vinny if things went wrong.
Also, at times when Vinny is speaking, he's like a cross between Mr.Miyagi and the Great Manitu (give me a break). Specific to the tape, all the Indians speak with this spacey (East) indian guru voice, like they are filling in for Deprak Chopra. All the Indians immediately take a backseat to anything that McKnight says, like whatever he says is the most intelligent thing going.
Anyway to the story, it's actually very engaging, except that 'da too guys from Detroit' sound like they stepped out of a "Sopranos" episode. Know whatimean you jamocke. The Canadians must all be drinking water with something in it because they are as mellow as a bunch of 1960s anti-war demonstrators, ey.
Lastly, did anybody NOT guess that at sometime in the story, Alex would find a way to soften Natalie's heart (key the violins and cellos) so that she would see him in a 'better light' (tear, tear,tear!). Ugh. If you are going to find him a love interest, just do it, don't get all "Wisteria Lane" about it. Ok, I'm done. Hopefully the next book (gee do ya think Natalie will be in it) will be better.
Excellent October 23, 2007
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
I've read all of Steve Hamilton's books right when they've been published and I've loved them all. I'm now re-reading them, and just finished "Blood is the Sky" for the second time. I love Hamilton's relaxed, easy-reading style and I think Alex is a great protagonist. I also love the northern Michigan setting of his series; although I've never been to the UP, I live in Maine and have spent a large part of my life in northern Ontario (where most of this book is set), so I can relate to his descriptions of life in the North. I do have two quibbles with this book. First, a couple times Hamilton has Alex saying road signs mention someplace is X number of miles away--in Canada, road signs are in kilometers, not miles. Second, there are lots of references to "Canadian" beer, such as when Alex gets a cold "Canadian" or asks a bartender for a Molson. In the first instance, does Hamilton mean a generic cold Canadian beer, or does he mean a Molson Canadian (a specific brand, and the best-selling beer in Canada), and in the second, you don't go into a drinking establishment in Canada and ask for a Molson; you ask for an Ex or a Canadian or another specific Molson product. As I said, these are quibbles. Steve Hamilton is a great author!
 First and not the last October 1, 2006
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
My wife kept raving on how good the books were. She was up to four read and kept talking about them. I finished another novel and decided it was time. What a interesting story. Especially living in Michigan all my life I found so much research had been done on all of Michigan and Canada also. We in Michigan always have a close relationship with Canada. Many of us have one side of the family from Canada as the auto industry had once brought them here. The book certainly was interesting and the plot gave you great cause to wonder almost to the last pages. I would recommend it highly.
The best McKnight adventure since Cold Day in Paradise May 24, 2006
In this Alex McKnight mystery, Hamilton pairs Alex and Vinnie LeBlanc to search for Vinnie's missing brother in the forests of Northern Ontario. Tom, Vinnie's brother, led a hunting expedition for four Detroit businessmen and then disappeared. Together Alex and Vinnie must find out what happened to him and why. This is Hamilton's best McKnight adventure since A Cold Day in Paradise. Alex's dogged nature shines through, as he remains fiercely loyal to Vinnie and is willing to sacrifice everything for the truth. Get ready for a great outdoors expedition in Canada. Hamilton is an excellent writer, and there's nothing better than reading an Alex McKnight mystery. It is my favorite mystery series.
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