Placid's View: A Mike Diamond Mystery

Mike Diamond lives quietly in the Adirondack Mountains. His home, at the edge of Lake Placid, America's figure-skating capital, is tucked away at the end of a country road which disappears into the fields of an old, deserted farm. It is the perfect retreat for someone commenting on the play of life as a detched observer. He walks the empty fields with Chaucer and Marlowe, his English setters, and teaches his courses at a nearby college.

But life has its own way of arranging things, and Mike finds himself involved with Judy Moraine as well as a Native American artist Jake Whitesnow, a Mohawk who can paint only when he is away from his home on the Reservation.

And when Mike is asked to talk with Christina Clark, the girl friend of one od his students, because, "you're the only one we can trust," Mike agrees even as the cautionary voice in his head tells him to avoid involvement.

But Christina, a figure skater working her way up to Olympic-level competition, is found gruesomely murdered on the practice rink in the Olympic Arena and her boyfriend is police chief Giafne's only suspect. Never mind the strange phone calls Christina had been receiving; never mind the secret meeting involving plans for a multi-million dollar development Christina had stumbled onto, Chief Giafne is after Mike's student.

Mike finds himself more and more involved in the lives of the people he cares about as he tries to untangle the mystery. Jake puts away his paints and leads Mike into the Adirondack woods. Judy's courage is tested after her skills as a librarian unearth vital information. A desperate rescue ignites the passions which culminate in an explosive scene in the Olympic Arena and the disclosure of the killer.

Murray Heller is the author of Black Names in America: History and Origin and Call Me Adirondack, the story of how places in the Adirondacks were named. In creating the Mike Diamond series Mr. Heller, a long-time resident of Saranac Lake and Lake Placid, combines his love of the Adirondacks with his love of good mystery.