Northwest Angle - My Comfort Food

One of the books that I just finished in the past week was Northwest Angle by William Kent Krueger. This is the eleventh book in the Cork O’Conner mystery series I started reading this series several years ago and have enjoyed this series very much. As with most series, some books are better than others; or I should say, I liked some books better than others. Other readers might disagree on which are the best.

The great thing about series is that you know the characters and have grown with them as they have grown and learned. The best thing about a good series, and these are no exception, is that each book is its own story. You don’t have a cliffhanger where you have to run out to get the next installment. I think of my favorite series as my comfort food of the literary world.

Having said all that, I may be getting to the end of this particular series. The thing I liked about it was his investigations of crimes and the intertwining of the Native American culture with the story. This latest story seemed strained to come up with a viable investigation and had more to do with a weather occurrence than the crimes that followed it. For me, it failed to build the suspense and drama that previous installments of this series have done. The character might be coming to the end of his run.

It was still a well crafted story and worth reading but not up to the author's usual high level.

I would give it three and a half stars if I had to grade it. I did enjoy the story. I saw most of the twists coming and that is why it wasn’t as enjoyable for me. A lot of the story centered on Cork’s kids and their decisions rather than his own, so the story tended to be a lot less focused than it usually is. I think that was a distraction, also.

While this wasn’t my favorite installment of the series, I’ll still keep reading. This is my comfort food after all.

But that’s just my opinion.

~Jeff