A Cold and Lonely Place

At the start of Henry’s haunting follow-up to her Agatha-winning debut, Learning to Swim (2011), reporter Troy Chance stumbles onto what could be the story that changes her career—as well as several lives—when the ice cutters she’s photographing on New York’s Saranac Lake for a feature about the Lake Placid–area resort’s annual Winter Carnival find a man frozen under the surface. Almost as shocking, the victim is someone Troy knows—trust fund slacker Tobin Winslow, her roommate Jessamyn’s boyfriend. Which makes the waiflike Jessamyn most definitely a person of interest to police. As Troy start digging, unexpectedly joining forces with Win, Tobin’s impossible-to-dislike sister, she quickly discovers there are even more questions concerning Tobin’s life than his death. Adding considerably to the compulsively readable mystery that unfolds—marred only by an anemic romantic subplot carried over from Swim—is Henry’s bone-deep sense of this terribly beautiful place. Agent: Barney Karpfinger, the Karpfinger Agency. (Feb.)