Russell and Leduc Mysteries

As winter approaches a small village in the Laurentians, north of Montreal, a reclusive older woman is found strangled outside her home. Roméo Leduc, the enigmatic Chief Inspector for Homicide, is one day away from his first vacation in years but reluctantly answers the call on the case. Marie Russell did not know her elderly neighbour, and she does not expect to become embroiled in solving her murder. Like most people in her sleepy town, Marie values the quiet months after tourists and cottagers leave. But when a startling clue links the crime to a terrible incident that happened on Marie's suburban Montreal street in the 1970s, Marie becomes an inadvertent detective. As Marie and Roméo combine wits to find the killer, they are forced to face demons from their own pasts as they confront a case where no one and nothing is really as it seems.

The sequel to The Birds That Stay - hailed by the New York Journal of Books as "a fascinating and gripping tale of suspense" and the Globe and Mail as one of "Ten thrillers that will keep you on the edge of your seat". Says Ann Cleeves of the new book: "it's about power and powerlessness in the dead of winter. And more than that, it's a rollicking good read." The Dogs of Winter begins after a howling snowstorm envelops Montreal, and the body of a young woman is discovered in its wake. The only clue to her identity is the photograph in her pocket, and on it, the phone number of Detective Inspector Romeo Leduc. Meanwhile, Marie and Romeo are busy navigating their deepening relationship, and a student at Marie's college is the victim of a terrible assault. While Romeo begins to think that the dead woman may be linked to violence against several homeless people in the city, the search for justice in both cases is thwarted by societal apathy and ignorance, even as the killer is stalking the frigid streets of Montreal, preying on and terrorizing its most vulnerable citizens.