The Hunting Wind: An Alex McKnight Mystery (Alex McKnight Novels)

Amazon.com Review Alex McKnight, the burned-out former cop turned PI of Steve Hamilton's Edgar Award-winning first novel, A Cold Day in Paradise , was a promising catcher who never quite made it to the majors. But his old teammate Randy Wilkins did, for one game with the Detroit Tigers that effectively ended the pitcher's career. What Randy can't forget about that game was the beautiful young woman he met the night before he blew his future in professional sports. Over two decades later, he's come to McKnight to track down the mysterious Maria, whose memory still haunts him. The trail is pretty cold after all these years, but Alex manages to get a line on Maria's relatives, who aren't exactly thrilled to make his acquaintance. In fact, they're downright hostile when Alex finds them in a small Michigan town, and he just barely escapes with his life. But he perseveres, and ultimately makes his way to an even smaller resort town, where the natives are almost as unfriendly. The police chief is so hostile to Alex's efforts that he quickly realizes someone else is on her tail, and that there's a good reason she's been hiding out for so long. Not only that, when someone shoots Randy and almost kills him, Alex is in for another nasty surprise. His old friend isn't who he seems to be, and Alex himself may be the victim of exactly the kind of scam Randy's been running since he left the majors. Hamilton has a well-developed sense of place, and he's good at exploring the complexities of his protagonist. But it's Randy the reader wants more fully realized, even after the mystery is solved and Alex makes a beeline back to Paradise. This is a taut, well-written thriller that fulfills Hamilton's promise as a writer to watch. --Jane Adams From Publishers Weekly Edgar and Shamus Awards-winner Hamilton's third Alex McKnight thriller (after A Cold Day in Paradise; Winter of the Wolf Moon) is the next best thing to Evelyn Wood. It is un-put-downable. McKnight, a former Detroit cop, was "retired" by a bullet that remains lodged in his chest. He owns a small business in upstate Michigan and likes to spend his time in the local pub watching his beloved Tigers on TV. One day, an old friend walks in a man he hasn't seen for 30 years. Alex has a soft spot for old buddies who exploit him mercilessly. This one is no exception. He wants Alex to help him find an former girlfriend whom he hasn't seen in decades. As he won't listen to reason, he and Alex are soon in Detroit on the almost nonexistent trail of his boyhood love. It is a leisurely but interesting trek that doesn't quicken until it seems to peter out entirely. Then, an unexpected act of violence causes everything we have believed real to blur into a haze of doubt. We are in the glorious, shadowy realm of noir where nothing is what it seems. Alex, the street-smart cop, is momentarily a babe in the woods in a pit of vipers. Hamilton's prose moves us smoothly along and his characters are marvelously real. His world is an existential one merciless to the innocent but in this exceptionally entertaining novel, McKnight is a decent man whose wits are a match for a whole world of vipers. Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

It's April in Paradise, a small town in Michigan's Upper Peninsula. Alex McKnight is warming himself by the fire, unaware of the visitor who is traveling 3,000 miles to see him that very night. It is Randy Wilkins, Alex's old minor league teammate. They've had no contact in thirty years, but Randy is convinced that Alex is the right man to help him on an unusual quest--to find Maria, the one true love of Randy's life. The only problem? Randy walked away from her in 1971 and hasn't seen or heard from her since. With the aid of his occasional partner, Leon Prudell, Alex agrees to accompany Randy on a short trip to Detroit, Maria's last known home. Alex knows it's a crazy idea, but what's the worst that could happen?

Kirkus Reviews

Alex McNight is hoisting a couple in his favorite local, the Glasgow Inn, when in waltzes Randy Wilkins to put a crimp into his not doing much. True, Alex, a sometime private eye, seldom does do much, though ladies in distress have on occasion (Winter of the Half Moon) got him to stir a stump. At any rate, Randy is an old friend who's made his way to Michigan's Upper Peninsula because he needs help. He's looking for a lost love—well and truly lost, since Randy walked out on Maria Valeska 30 years ago and hasn't set eyes on her since. Why ask Alex for help? Well, as youngsters they were teammates on a minor-league Toledo club—Randy a talented southpaw pitcher, Alex his good field, no hit catcher. And the thing about the pitcher-catcher relationship, he explains, is that it gives rise to a mystical, indefinable bond. For instance, Randy tells Alex, I could never lie to you. It soon develops, however, that he certainly can, and that for him lying is as natural as the slinky, the sucker curve that was once his money pitch. But Alex is nothing if not quixotic, and so off he goes on the Maria-quest, during which he gets warned off, beaten up, shot at, and generally mistreated and manhandled while tilting at windmills to mixed effect. If the story line sounds weak and wandering, it is: a double disappointment after Alex's two engaging forerunners.

Before he became a private investigator, before he served in the Detroit police, and long before he retreated to the wintry reaches of Michigan's Upper Peninsula, Alex McKnight played ball in the minor leagues. He doesn't spend much time thinking about those days, at least not until a former teammate comes looking for him. . . . The man's here to ask a favor. He wants Alex to help him find the woman with whom he had a brief, passionate affair three decades ago. Who is Alex to deny his friend a chance to ward off a classic midlife chill by rekindling an old flame? But as the search deepens, McKnight begins to suspect that he hasn't been told the full story. And there might just be a reason why this mysterious woman is so hard to find. The Hunting Wind continues Steve Hamilton's award-winning and New York Times -bestselling Alex McKnight series. An old friend tears ex-Detroit cop Alex McKnight away from his barstool in Michigan's Upper Peninsula to search for the woman he walked out on thrirty years before. As the search progress, Alex learns that the job will be much more dangerous than he first thought. Alex McKnight finds himself in over his head when he and his occasional partner, Leon Prudell, agree to help Randy Wilkins, his old minor league teammate, find Randy's old flame, a woman he had walked away from nearly thirty years before Alex McKnight finds himself in over his head when he and his occasional partner, Leon Prudell, agree to help former minor league teammate Randy Wilkins, find Randy's old flame, a woman he had walked away from nearly thirty years before