With the news that the nineteenth book in William Kent Krueger’s Cork O’Connor series, Fox Creek, will be released in August, I thought it was time to share another of Sandie Herron’s reviews of the audiobooks in the series. Manitou Canyon is the fifteenth in the series. Sandie reviews the audio for “Have You Heard?”

Manitou Canyon
Written by William Kent Krueger
Narrated by David Chandler
Series:  Cork O’Connor, Book 15
Unabridged Audiobook
Recorded Books (9/6/2016)
Listening Length:  11 hours 34 minutes

Cork O’Connor has just returned from an extensive search and rescue operation in the Iron Lake Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness of northern Minnesota.  As former sheriff and now private investigator, he joined the search teams looking for John Harris.  He and his two grandchildren had gone for a brief respite yet John Harris seemed to have simply vanished.  No trace of him, dead or alive, could be found. 

Lindsay and Trevor Harris have come to Cork asking him to continue the search.  They explain that Trevor has had a dream in which Cork’s son Stephen appears and tells him there are monsters in the woods.  John Harris had been a childhood friend, so Cork agrees, and Lindsay accompanies him.  In a concurrent plotline, while Cork and Lindsay begin to explore the same areas at Raspberry Lake, Cork’s son Stephen returns home saying he’s been having a bad feeling that something is wrong. 

Cork’s family had already begun gathering in Aurora for Jenny’s wedding just a few days away.  Even fiancé Daniel’s Aunt Leah returns to town after 50 years arriving on Ojibwe medicine man Henry Meloux’s doorstep on Crow Point just as the others have gathered to help Stephen and Trevor Harris explore the dream and Stephen’s dread.  Aunt Leah’s agenda is unclear, but her presence disruptive.

When Cork fails to check in with the satellite phone, his family becomes more concerned.  They go to the Boundary Water by floatplane and find the camp that Cork and Lindsay had set up vacant.  As they check the area, they find a large patch of blood and traces of others at the camp.  Now the sheriff and her team join the search for Cork.

Meanwhile, Cork and Lindsay have been kidnapped, leaving Raspberry Lake via a route seldom used by the Ojibwe, which is why, Cork now understands, they found no trace of anyone else there on the previous search and why Cork’s family can find no clues now.  Befuddled, they return to Aurora to question Trevor for answers as to why his family has disappeared only to gather when Aunt Leah has her first vision, one of hundreds of people dying.

As these two storylines work their way toward each other, with each group discovering facts about the other, author Krueger ratchets up the tension.  A growing sense of urgency comes over the kidnappers as we learn their ultimate, complex goal.  Those left behind in Aurora are piecing things together as well, until the two groups ultimately collide with a big bang.  Yet our anxiety cannot dissipate until we know if the visions are true. 

As usual with a Krueger novel, in this fifteenth entry in the series we are treated to his glorious descriptions of the land and its beauty.  It is that very beauty and pristine nature that drives this story, along with the beloved characters of Cork and his family.   Narrator David Chandler makes the abundant use of the Ojibwe language, always translated, enrich the storytelling.

By book’s end, Cork O’Connor finds himself much more comfortable in his own skin.  He has been struggling to accept his role as ogichidaa, protector of his people, but feeling as if he had failed.  Finally, he finds peace in this role he has played all along.  His family has grown, and his heart embraces them all.