A Fine and Bitter Snow

Change never comes easy so when the news breaks that the new administration oil might be drilling for oil soon in a wildlife preserve in southeastern Alaska, home to P.I. Kate Shugak, battle lines are quickly drawn across the community. But for Kate, who hasn't been able to get back into her daily life ever since her lover's violent death a few months ago, it's a welcome reprieve from doing nothing.
Tensions run high when Kate's friend and chief park ranger, Dan O'Brien, is deemed "too green" for them by management and asked to take early retirement. Kate rallies the troops to fight for his job, but before she can really start throwing her weight around, a longtime resident is found brutally murdered. Alaska State Trooper Jim Chopin enlists Kate in the investigation, and it isn't long before she discovers that when it comes to the beauty and danger of living and dying in Alaska, nothing is as simple as it seems...
"The new administration." Dan waved a hand at the map of Alaska on the wall behind him. "They want to drill in ANWR. I'm on record as not
thinking it's the best idea the federal government has ever had, and now everyone's mad at me, from City Hall in Kaktovik to the Department of the Interior in Washington, D.C. You should see some of the E-mails I've been getting. Like to melt down the computer." He ran a hand through a thick thatch of stiff red hair that was beginning to recede at his temples, then rubbed both hands over a square face with open blue eyes and a lot of freckles that refused to fade. "I've never wanted to be anything but what I am, a park ranger in Alaska. But hell, I don't know. The secretary won't even listen to her own employees. They want to drill. And they're looking at Iqaluk, too."