Medicine Dog

A search for horse thieves and murderers during a freezing winter and early spring in contemporary Wyoming is the basis of this atmospheric but contrived first mystery. Living in the small town of Medicine Dog, reformed alcoholic, one-time sportswriter and now would-be detective Boyd Sherman is hired by Jennifer Landrus to look for her missing husband, Rusty--who immediately turns up dead and is recognized by Sherman as a mobster he once knew. Meanwhile, a couple of Jennifer's horses have been stolen; while in the mountains searching for them, Sherman runs into his ex-wife, with whom he is reconciled even as they discover that the horse thieves are also involved in heroin operations. A police bust in the nick of time saves Sherman's hide and allows him to string together tenuous strands of villainous activity and bring some wrongdoers to justice. Though the dialogue has the feel of real conversation, and Peterson's spare style skillfully evokes the dreary winter Wyoming landscape, coincidence and expediency mar the resolution of the mystery. (Aug.)