Why a Booktrail?
2000s: A murder mystery set in the remote glacial landscape of the Northern Arctic Circle where the harshness of the environment makes for some chilling goings on.
White Heat – Edie Kiglatuk 1
What you need to know before your trail
Craig Island, just off the coast of Ellesmere Island in Arctic Canada is a cold, harsh and unforgiving place to be for some.
Duck hunters roam the land, and the community here is indigenous and used to a certain way of life. Inuit teacher and guide Edie Kiglatuk is a native to this land and enjoys introducing strangers, outsiders to her part of the world but then when one man is found dead, the locals and the town elders are keen to keep this matter underwraps.
But death doesn’t stop there and Edie is soon wondering just what else this cold harsh landscape will reveal next. And the fact that her beloved land seems to be a crime scene of something really bad.
But what?
Locations
ResetTravel Guide
Ellesmere Island is closer to Greenland than Canada but it is part of the Nunavut area of Canada and is high up in the northern most part of the Arctic circle. A more remote and icy place there could not be so perfect for a crime where no one can hear you scream….
“If the bears didn’t spook them, then the blistering cold, the scouring winds, the ferocious sun and the roar of the icepack usually did the job”
This is the land where the Inuits live and their communities, way of life and culture are painstakingly evoked here with skill. MJ McGrath is a travel and non fiction writer and it shows in the landscape and environment are painted and crafted with skill. So vivid, so chilling and such a wide and rounded picture.
“A gust of wind whipped frost smoke off the icepack”
With mysterious deaths occurring and the elders seemingly wanting to cover them up, something is going on, but in a cold and remote landscape there are not many ways to turn for help. Living in the Arctic is difficult enough so dying is a very complicated business. So why do ‘qungik’ (White people) want to come here? –
“Maybe it was just the romance of the high Arctic they were after, the promise of living authentically in the wild with the Eskimo”
Snow, the chilling wind, the wind factor and the Inuit fur will tickle and slap your face as you read.
So why would the Inuits want to keep this quiet and how do they live their lives whilst the world around them continues to change? This is a land and a people feeling threatened by past injustices between them and others, fearful of the exploitation of energy and other companies and the struggle of preserving their heritage.
But something is stalking the ice – and it’s not just the drugs and drink that pervades this land.
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Twitter: @mcgrathmj
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Web: melaniemcgrath.com
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