Into the Fire

close call by Blake Pierce is Book 2 in A Kari Blackhorse Mystery Series.

Kari Blackhorse has moved into her deceased mother's house (Anna Chee) on the Navajo Reservation where Kari is one of the detectives in the Navajo Nation Police Department. She and her partner Detective Ben Tsosie are called out to a murder site at a defunct uranium mine (Sleeping Dog Mine) which hasn't been active for years due to its environmental damage done associated with the radiation poisoning causing many deaths from cancers. Between the three bodies at the scene, ceremonial symbols, and heretofore supposedly unknown petroglyphs, it appears there will be significant tribal conflict ahead with the company that owns the mine. 

Kari's mother has done great amounts of research on this mine with multiple files in her office including a locked desk drawer that Kari has never felt compelled to unlock until now. As per the situation in Book 1, the FBI must be called in to lead the investigation. This time her father's FBI friend, who was like a fun uncle to her as a child, has learned to respect her and her partner's insights and contributions from the first case and is far more flexible with them this time around. 

After considerable investigations with those who've recorded meticulous notations of the mine's corporate ownership's conduct regarding the tribal deaths from the radiation cancers, Kari and Ben finally figure out an obtuse but viable lead which quickly leads to a confrontational climactic moment in the mine.

close call is an entertaining mystery, well-written, while incorporating much of the spiritual aspects of Navajo beliefs. For me, as a Christian, much of their religion runs parallel with Christianity without acknowledging God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit. They include demonology, but not identifying it as demonic, as having locations where there is a thin veil – which makes those places dangerous – between this world and the spirit realm with issued warnings to basically leave those places and whatever encompasses them alone. In my faith, we war against them, reminding them that Jesus has overcome their world. 

Father, thank you for authors, their work and research. May each one learn from whom their talent is given. In the Name of Jesus, Amen.