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Call it crime froid, not crime noir. A new genre seems to be developing in which Canadian thriller writers use winter as an atmospheric backdrop for unfolding intrigue. To a list that features such compelling novels as Giles Blunt's
Forty Words for Sorrow, John Farrow's
Ice Lake, and Michael E. Rose's
The Mazovia Legacy, you can add
The Border Guards, the first novel from Toronto author Mark Sinnett. Sinnett has previously published a collection of stories,
Bull, and two much-praised books of poetry. His literary talent is displayed here via some lovely turns of phrase, but Sinnett also shows a knack for well-choreographed action and skilfully layered suspense.
Set primarily in Kingston and the Thousand Islands area, a popular summertime playground that in winter becomes a treacherous and desolate locale seemingly populated primarily by spies, smugglers, and border patrols, The Border Guards features a colourful United Nations-style cast of characters that includes Russian gangster Nikolai Petrovitch, Canadian political power broker Michael Hollins and his restaurateur son Tim, FBI agent John Selby, art dealer Hanne Kristiansen, and English soccer hooligan turned executioner Adams Denver. The novel opens on Christmas Day, but the setting is far from festive or tranquil. Tim and his chef Rebecca are forced to flee their riverside restaurant, hiding in an ice crevice as potential assassins hunt them down. Sinnett leaves their fate up in the air, and cleverly begins to explain how they got in that predicament, in a story that is consistently gripping and as fast-paced as a toboggan ride down a frozen slope.
The plot line of The Border Guards allows for some interesting discussion of such topics as international security in the post 9/11 world and Toronto's methods of garbage disposal, and it even draws a fascinating potential link between the two. Sinnett also shows a knack for convincing characterization. The oft-tense relationship between Tim and Michael Hollins, Tim's slow-developing romance with Rebecca, and Selby's turbulent affair with Hanne are all delineated with a compassionate touch. Even a character as loathsome as Denver is allowed to show some humanity. (Anyone who recognizes the the Blur album 13 as a classic break-up record can't be all evil.) Unlike their real-life namesakes, The Border Guards can be approached with a happy confidence. An entertaining encounter is guaranteed. --Kerry Doole
Books in Canada
This is another page-turner set in Thousand Islands area of Southern Ontario, sort of a second tier crime-adventure novel. Tim Hollins is a young restaurant manager, whose father, Michael Hollins, was a powerful financier and politician, until his tragic death in a car accident. The story opens as Tim and his girlfriend escape the restaurant into the winter wilderness dodging a hitman. The tale flashes back a month. Tim is reluctantly beginning to investigate his father’s supposedly accidental death, and, of course, nothing is quite as it seems. There is a spy, a Russian mobster, a former British soccer hooligan turned hitman. There are lots of close calls as Tim slowly comes to understand that he knew virtually nothing of his father’s life. The story is never as exciting as it should be, and it is hard to care whether any of the characters live or die, which certainly slows the turning of the pages.
W.P. Kinsella (Books in Canada)
