A riveting and suspenseful read with a memorable cast of characters, startling twists, a brave, smart, feisty heroine, and an unexpected ending.” -Emily Melton, Booklist
Steep and Deep
Ski patroller Greta Westerlind discovers there’s a darker side to the glamorous skiers’ paradise of Aspen in this intriguing thriller.
The last thing ski patroller Greta Westerlind expects to find during routine avalanche training is the severed hand of her best friend. Evie Kearney is the latest woman to mysteriously disappear in the Aspen Mountains. Yet while an investigation is launched to find the rest of the body, Greta is relegated to the sidelines. The sheriff believes she’s too close to this one, but that’s exactly why she can’t possibly stop.
Soon Greta is embroiled in a gruesome game of cat and mouse, as twisty and dangerous as Aspen’s black diamond runs. Something sinister is happening on her mountain. Someone is trying to scare her away from learning what’s become of Evie. But Greta’s determined to find out . . . even if it means sharing the same fate.
This dark and twisty thriller is the second book in the Aspen mystery series, perfect for fans of Ruth Ware.
Appearances
Explore Booksellers
- 221 E Main St. Aspen • February 19, 5:30 - 6:30 pm • Book Signing and Talk
Barnes and Noble
- Glenwood Meadows, 115 E. Meadows Drive, Glenwood Springs • February 21, 2:00 - 4:00 pm • Book Signing
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Hardcover
This compelling, Scandinavian noir-style thriller should appeal to readers of both Ruth Ware and Arnaldur Indridason.” -Booklist
First Tracks
When experienced ski patroller Greta Westerlind awakes in hospital having almost been killed in an avalanche, she is devastated to learn that her close friend, bond trader Warren McGovern, perished in the slide. With no memory of the incident, Greta is at a loss to explain why the two of them were skiing in such lethal terrain in the first place.
As she struggles to unlock her memories as to what really happened that day, a series of strange and menacing incidents convinces Greta that someone means to harm her. Then a young woman disappears, and events take a terrifying new twist…
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Read Reviews — First Tracks
Ski patroller Greta Westerlind is having a rough week, beginning with being caught in a terrifying avalanche in which her dear friend Warren was killed, then suffering from carbon-monoxide poisoning, and capped off with the attempted arson of her home. With her memory of the avalanche in tatters, Greta feels as if her world is as inverted as that of a skier lost in a snowstorm. Adrenaline junkie Greta lives for the mountains of Aspen, where she can have perfect powder and glorious scenery every day, but getting back to her normal life remains imperiled both by her failure to uncover what really happened that day on the mountain and by the series of Ted Bundy–like murders in the area. This compelling, Scandinavian noir–style thriller should appeal to readers of both Ruth Ware and Arnaldur Indridason. -Booklist
In Catherine O’Connell’s new novel, our hero is an Aspen Mountain ski patroller. “First Tracks” is the first entry in a planned series for O’Connell, centered on patroller Greta Westerlind. The book will be published July 1, but O’Connell is unveiling it for local readers early with a signing at Explore Booksellers. She dedicated “First Tracks” to five local women working as ski patrollers and instructors, and drew inspiration from them for Greta.
A longtime Aspenite, O’Connell began visiting Aspen during her time as a college student in Boulder in the mid-1970s and mostly settled here in 1979. She’s admittedly nervous about locals reading her depiction of the town. “I don’t want to insult anyone,” she said. “But I’m writing a crime book, so I have to have a bit of fun with my characters and immensely wealthy people give me a lot to work with.”
“First Tracks” is a character-driven mystery centered on a smart and resourceful Ajax ski patroller. Much of Greta’s narrative is a sort of love letter to skiing and O’Connell has an easy, tactile way of describing ski scenes that will make any local pine for a powder run down Jackpot. O’Connell peppers the first-person narrative with knowing local color. The book is written such that it will give locals much to appreciate, but won’t exclude a general readership. -Aspen Times
The descriptions of skiing and cold-weather survival skills grip. Those who enjoy reading about the lifestyles of the horribly rich will be most rewarded. -Publishers Weekly
I woke to the sound of the phone ringing and with a sick, sinking feeling I wasn’t alone.” -Excerpt
The Last Night Out
Six friends. Three secrets. One murder.
Maggie is destined to marry the perfect man in two weeks. Desperate for a last wild night on the town before the big day, she gathers her closest friends for a night to remember.
Only things go wrong – horribly wrong.
Angie’s body is found in the park the following morning and their night to remember quickly becomes a nightmare they wish they could forget. Under police scrutiny, how far will Maggie and her friends go to keep their secrets? Far enough to protect a killer?
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Read Reviews — The Last Night Out
A bachelorette party changes the lives of six Chicago women. The creator of the High Society mysteries has produced a stand-alone that does for the 1980s what Mary McCarthy’s The Group did for the ’30s, with more than a little mystification thrown in. -Kirkus Reviews
Early one June morning in 1988, back when “Cher and people who lived in trailers were the only ones with tattoos,” Maggie Trueblood, the heroine of this superior mystery from O’Connell, wakes up in bed with Steven, a carpenter she met at a Chicago nightclub after her boozy bachelorette party. The story sashays in some surprising directions before briskly pulling all the disparate threads together in a slam-bang finale. O’Connell tells this intricately plotted tale with verve. -Publishers Weekly
Catherine O’Connell has written a detailed and deftly plotted thriller that is as much a romance novel as it is a mystery with several twists. It’s doubtful even the most canny reader will guess the culprit until the tense final chapters, and the revelations in Kelly’s part of the epilogue will stay in the mind for a long time. -Toni V. Sweeney
Ms. O’Connell is, quite simply, a hell of a storyteller, a master of plot, a tart observer of the social scene. -Frank McCourt
O’Connell’s wry observations on the rich are hugely entertaining. -Chicago Sun-Times
Brimming with witty observations about the well-heeled and the machinations of greedy businessmen, this sophisticated romp takes the daring amateur sleuth all the way to Thailand and Vietnam.” -Publishers Weekly
Well Read and Dead
The return of blue-blooded fashionista Pauline Cook, whose search for a missing friend leads her from an iconoclastic book group to the deepest and most unfashionable reaches of the Far East.
Back in Chicago after a disastrous European love affair, socialite Pauline Cook finds her finances nearly depleted, her co-op a shambles, and her best friend mysteriously missing—vanished along with Pauline’s cat. Though Whitney Armstrong’s husband offers a substantial reward for the return of his lost wife, Pauline can’t help suspecting that his grief is merely an act. But it’s a shocking suggestion by a member of Whitney’s book club that really gets Pauline moving—halfway around the world, in fact, to Thailand… in spite of a psychic’s warning of terrible danger.
In Asia, a morass of dark motives and deadly corporate intrigues await the intrepid globe-trotter. And all the high society connections in the world aren’t going to ensure that Pauline makes it home alive…
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Read Reviews — Well Read and Dead
This is the second adventure for Chicago’s Golden Mile socialite widow Pauline Cook. Initially, it seems difficult to have much sympathy for a slightly ditzy, superficial multimillionaire who seems to regularly float into irresponsible relationships. But Pauline does have a strong sense of loyalty and a surprising amount of common sense. Readers will find themselves warming to this improbable high-society sleuth who challenges our assumptions about what a mystery heroine should be like. -Booklist
The perils of Pauline Cook, society widow extraordinaire, include some decidedly dark twists in O’Connell’s otherwise lighthearted second mystery. Brimming with witty observations about the well-heeled and the machinations of greedy businessmen, this sophisticated romp takes the daring amateur sleuth all the way to Thailand and Vietnam. -Publishers Weekly
The surprising denouement includes a last line that’s laugh-out-loud funny. Fans of Nancy Martin’s Blackbird Sisters mysteries will enjoy Pauline’s escapades.” -Publishers Weekly
Well Bred and Dead
Newly widowed Pauline Cook was once the toast of the Windy City elite—but now she’s practically broke. At least she’s in better shape than her dear departed friend Ethan Campbell, whose corpse Pauline has had the misfortune to discover. A writer who chronicled the lives, loves, and ensembles of the Gold Coast’s most elegant ladies, Ethan apparently took his own life—while inelegantly clad in old boxers, no less. And since no relatives are coming forward to claim Ethan’s remains, it falls to Pauline to settle his final affairs… with her own dwindling funds.
However, there are things about Ethan’s suicide that don’t seem to add up: the ratty undergarments he “chose” to die in, for example… and the multiple birth certificates the police turn up in his apartment. Before she can truly lay her friend to rest, plucky Pauline’s determined to get to the bottom of his increasingly suspicious death.
Read Reviews — Well Bred and Dead
Meet Pauline Cook, star of O’Connell’s sparkling stand-alone. Cook, a widowed Chicago socialite, is devastated by the apparent suicide of her dear friend, gay society columnist Ethan Campbell. Her search for answers takes her to England; Boston; Rochester, N.Y.; and Charleston, S.C. The surprising denouement includes a last line that’s laugh-out-loud funny. Fans of Nancy Martin’s Blackbird Sisters mysteries will enjoy Pauline’s escapades. -Publishers Weekly
About Catherine
Chicago native Catherine O’Connell is the author of First Tracks (Severn House/Black Thorn), The Last Night Out (Severn House/Black Thorn), Well Read and Dead (Harper), Well Bred and Dead (Harper), and Skins (Donald I Fine).
A graduate of the University of Colorado School of Journalism, Catherine worked in a number of fields to gain insight into the many walks of life incorporated into her novels including stints in the hotel and restaurant industry, commodities markets, and as a sales executive.
Catherine O’Connell is a member of Mystery Writers of America and sits on the boards of Aspen Words, the literary branch of The Aspen Institute, and English in Action, a mentoring program that teaches English as a second language. She serves as a moderator of the Sharing Shakespeare program at the Aspen Institute.
Catherine has appeared on ABC, NBC, CBS, the Cox network and numerous radio shows including WGN Radio’s After Hours with Rick Kogan.
An inveterate traveler, wine enthusiast, skier, biker and hiker, she divides her time between Aspen and Paris.