The Dogs Of Winter by Ann Lambert

 It's winter in Montreal and that brings even more danger to the lives of the homeless.  When a young woman's body is found in a highway tunnel, the first thought was that she had been hit by a car and indeed that happened.  But she would have survived that accident if the person who found her had not been a murderer who then killed her by kneeling on her chest and suffocating her.  The woman had no identification but in her pockets are found two items that might help identify her.  One is a picture of her with a woman and the other is the business card of Detective Inspector Romeo Leduc.

Leduc doesn't know the woman and has no idea how she came to have his card.  He is busy with his own cases and this one is out of his jurisdiction.  But he soon comes to suspect that a killer is stalking the homeless, especially those with dogs, suffocating them and taking their animals.  He attempts to be involved in the case which spans several jurisdictions but he also has other things going on in his life.  His daughter is involved with a guy the detective doesn't like or trust.  His oldest friend wants him to help find his sister who disappeared several years before.  Most importantly, his romantic partner, Marie Russell, wants the couple to take the next step forward in their relationship and live together.  As the cases mount, can Leduc find the killer?

I listened to this novel, read by the author. Many think that authors are the worst readers of their work as the job requires specialized talents but I thought Lambert did an excellent job with the narration. It is evident that the areas she had written to be stressed were and her voice was a great one to listen to for extended times.

This is the second novel in the series.  Leduc and Russell are an interesting couple; she is 61,he is 51.  Russell is a college professor who used to be a marine biologist and is no shrinking violet.  She is determined that they will move forward but on her terms, in her house out in the rural country.  Although the couple seems to work, I found Marie to be demanding and ungiving in her expectations.  I liked Leduc much more but she provided him background to several issues that impacted his cases.  There were several alternate storylines going on in the novel such as sexual harassment/rape of a young woman in the workplace and a female entrepreneur who hides her crimes thinking it is for the greater good of female empowerment.  Overall, some of these miscellaneous threads could have been edited out to make a tighter story but I enjoyed the mystery.  This book is recommended for mystery and dog lovers.