The Bone Seeker

Praise

Praise for The Bone Seeker
 

“McGrath effectively evokes the spare Arctic landscape and brings life to the people who have inhabited it for generations.”—Publishers Weekly

 “The chills sent down your spine will rival those brought on by any Nunavut winter.”—Kirkus (starred review)

“[The Bone Seeker is] filled with cultural tensions, gorgeous Arctic spring scenery, and pulsing suspense….This puzzle weaves together both a murder and an environmental crime.”—Booklist (starred review)

“Vivid descriptions of the 24-hour-sun-drenched Canadian Arctic and…insights on contemporary Inuit life.”—National Geographic

“McGrath’s earlier Arctic-set novels were nonpareil in their freshness, and The Bone Seeker…is her best yet. There is an astonishing evocation of the frigid landscape here, along with the sharply conjured details of Inuit life.”—Financial Times

“Inventive….Powerful….Liberally laced with interesting Inuit cultural references, this intelligent murder mystery packs plenty of tension between the locals and outsiders.”—Monsters and Critics

Praise for The Boy in the Snow

 
“McGrath’s characters are both motivated and ruthless. It is Edie’s cunning intelligence and quick decision-making that keep the story moving.”—Oprah.com, selected as one of “7 Compulsively Readable Mysteries (For the Crazy-Smart Reader)”

“McGrath has a firm grasp on a little known culture, its values and language…This affecting novel should melt even the most frozen human hearts.”—Publishers Weekly (starred review)
 
“Edie is fierce in her desire for justice…[She] finds herself at mortal risk from the cold, so masterfully described that it chills the reader.”—Booklist
 
“Edie is blunt and tenacious, the plot compelling and the settings mesmerizing. McGrath is a fresh and compelling voice.”—Cleveland Plain Dealer

“The stoic Edie is a strong, determined heroine, though McGrath does tend to subject her to a lot of dire peril. But what would an Alaskan mystery be without frostbite and snow caves?”—Houston Chronicle

“[McGrath] is an author with a quietly impressive command of character…Yet the author’s real skill is in the astonishing evocation of the frigid landscape…What’s more, McGrath is able to keep all these elements satisfyingly balanced.”—Express.co.uk (UK)
 
“One of our most gifted younger writers…The snow-laden wastes of Alaska are so brilliantly evoked that hit almost makes you shiver reading it, and the plot is every bit as chilling, laced as it is with politics, sects and modern greed.”—Daily Mail (UK)
 
 

Praise for White Heat

 
“M.J. McGrath opens a window onto a fascinating and disappearing culture in this haunting mystery.”—Parade Magazine “12 Great Summer Books”
 
 
“This debut novel encompasses the hard, otherworldly beauty of the far north and the rapaciousness of energy moguls determined to exploit the area’s natural resources…[McGrath] skillfully describes the destabilizing effects of global warming, on both the landscape and the lives of the people settled there.”—The New Yorker 
 
“[McGrath] weaves a strong strand of whodunit into a broader story about life in a 21st-century community on Canada’s Ellesmere Island. The plot is wholly satisfying, and McGrath’s portrait of a culture that uneasily blends yesterday and today is engrossing on its own merits. The Arctic is a big place — big enough, one hopes, for Edie Kiglatuk to find another mystery that needs solving between warm bowls of seal blood soup fresh from the microwave.”—Associated Press
 
“In a gripping debut novel, McGrath (who has written nonfiction as Melanie McGrath) transports the reader to a land of almost incomprehensible cold and an unfamiliar but fascinating culture, taking on issues of climate change, energy exploration, local politics, and drug and alcohol abuse. Edie, a fiercely independent woman in a male-dominated milieu, is sure to win fans. Expect great things from this series.”—Booklist (starred)
 
“An arctic setting so real it’ll give you frostbite.”—Dana Stabenow, author of A Cold Day for Murder and Though Not Dead: A Shugak Novel
 
“A gripping crime novel in which the main character never runs (sweating leads to hypothermia), chews fermented walrus gut, and builds an emergency snowhouse with the right kind of three layered snow in a matter of hours…[a] deft story of family loyalty and clashing cultures…charging forward to an unexpected, satisfying, and chilling conclusion.”—New York Journal of Books
 
“Author McGrath’s sense of location is spot on; her characters are believable, sympathetic and complex. No surprise for an author of her caliber: In an earlier incarnation (as Melanie McGrath) she won the John Llewellyn Rhys Prize for best British writer under 35.”–Bookpage
 
“Award-winning British journalist McGrath shares a wealth of knowledge about life in the High Arctic that is central to her story. Well written and researched, her excellent adventure murder-mystery will hold readers’ attention until the last page.”—Library Journal
 
“A solid thriller…A picture soon emerges that includes a fight for precious natural resources and secrets that stretch back generations. McGrath captures the frigid landscape beautifully, and her heroine personifies the tension between the Inuit and qalunaat ways of life.”—Publishers Weekly

“McGrath has written a mystery…reminiscent of Tony Hillerman’s culture-clash novels. The language is beautiful, especially the descriptions of the Inuit people, living in “a place littered with bones, with spirits, with reminders of the past…surrounded by our stories.” Detailed in her knowledge of setting, McGrath vividly invokes the frozen land, and her portrayals of the rugged people who cherish its beauty and bounty, especially Edie and Derek, ring true. A promising first installment in an upcoming series of arctic adventures.”—Kirkus Reviews

“M. J. McGrath’s White Heat pulls you along like a steel cable, inexorably welding you to the characters and a place that you’ll never forget.”—Craig Johnson, New York Times bestselling author of The Cold Dish and As the Crow Flies