Cold Mourning

A Stonechild and Rouleau Mystery

By: Brenda Chapman

Narrated by: Michelle St. John

Nominated for the 2015 Arthur Ellis Award for Best Novel

When murder stalks a family over Christmas, Kala Stonechild trusts her intuition to get results.

It's a week before Christmas when wealthy businessman Tom Underwood disappears into thin air - with more than enough people wanting him dead.

New police recruit Kala Stonechild, who has left her northern Ontario detachment to join a specialized Ottawa crime unit, is tasked with returning Underwood home in time for the holidays. Stonechild, who is from a First Nations reserve, is a lone wolf who is used to surviving on her wits. Her new boss, Detective Jacques Rouleau, has his hands full controlling her, his team, and an investigation that keeps threatening to go off track.

Old betrayals and complicated family relationships brutally collide when love turns to hate and murder stalks a family.

©2014 Brenda Chapman (P)2017 Dundurn

Critic reviews

( Cold Mourning maintains its low-key feel just long enough to sneak up on you with its grit and promise." ( National Post)

Gratuitous violence towards women

As a woman, we are used to seeing movies, tv shows or reading books that begin with a vicious rape scene or rape-murder. Unfortunately this descriptive aggression towards women (for entertainment purposes) has become the norm. The descriptive and explicit sexual violence towards young girls and women in this novel are completely irrelevant to the story. This entire murder mystery could have literally gone without it and 0 part of the story would have been affected. When the book finished I found myself asking “but why did you put me through that?!” I admit I found the story enticing and almost ordered the sequel, only to read the description to find more martial rape and another vicious murder of a woman. Let’s do better, for god sakes. Also the narrator was breathing so heavily it was completely distracting. I had to consciously train myself to block out her loud inhales before every sentence. Again— can’t we do better?