As Prickly As An Arizona Cactus

There’s no such thing as a vacation. Not for you, anyway. You can’t escape work: even when you’re off the clock, you’re on the job, thinking about projects, heading off problems, solving conundrums or, in the new book “Sulfur Springs” by William Kent Krueger, solving crimes. Bad news usually starts with a phone call, as every parent knows, but the call that came to the home of retired Tamarack County Sheriff Cork O’Connor was different – the look on Cork’s new wife Rainy’s face was clear about that. She’d received a message from her son, Peter, and though it was staticky and nearly-unintelligible, two words were plain: “Rodriguez” and “killed.” Alarmed at the message and the fact that Peter wasn’t answering his phone, Rainy and Cork rushed to Arizona, near the Mexican border where, years before, Peter had spent three months in a rehab center. Once he’d finished treatment, Peter stuck around, got a job, and had been living in the area for some time but, after inquiring, Cork discovered that no one claimed to know him. Peter’s photo and his physical description drew blank looks, as well, but the local Border patrol seemed intent on following Cork and Rainy in their search. When Cork began to hear whispers of danger attached to his stepson’s name, and the remote starter on their rental Jeep turned the vehicle into a fireball, he and Rainy knew the whispers were true. Peter, it appeared, had his mother’s soft heart and had become a “Desert Angel” for illegal immigrants. His presence, therefore, was unwelcome in Sulfur Springs, and finding him (or his body) meant going deep into the desert. The unforgiving Arizona terrain was nothing like home in Minnesota. The people in Sulfur Springs were equally unyielding, but Cork couldn’t find Peter without help. The question was: who could he trust? “Sulfur Springs” may seem like something different – and it is, mostly. As a “Cork O’Connor Mystery,” it maintains the aura of the other novels in this series. Admittedly, its premise originally seems bland (illegal immigration and drug smuggling), but here’s the deliciousness: it’s served with a side dish of sand, cactus and nail-biting thrills. That last part will make fans take notice: the homegrown crook you’ve come to expect is gone, replaced by a bigger, wider web of worse. Furthermore, author William Kent Krueger’s signature character, a widower for many years, is now married and readers aren’t entirely led to embrace his new wife; she has a dark past that hints of something untold. Even Cork himself has changed with the wedding: he’s edgier and angrier. Everyone feels subtly, urgently, not-quite-comfortable here, and the mood is as prickly as an Arizona cactus because of it. That leads to a book that’s totally un-let-go-able, a can’t-miss for fans and a fresh obsession for new readers. Skip “Sulfur Springs” – no way!