Detective Drama with Bite

A review of Melissa Yi’s Wolf Ice (Olo Books, 2015).

By Derek Newman-Stille

Every crime scene is unique and every investigation of a crime scene has its challenges, but those challenges are magnified when the victim is a werewolf and she disappears under suspicious circumstances around other werewolves. When Elena dies, everyone is uncertain how to proceed. Human police can’t be involved, and all of the werewolves present have to rely on their various skills – medical, tracking, and hunting instincts to explore the multiple levels of secrets and suspicions surrounding this death. The werewolves are motivated by their caring for the victim and by their need to find safe territory to create an environment where they can be themselves. Yet the murder complicates their sense of belonging, their ideas about themselves, and their relat8onship to the human world. 

Yi complicates the relationship between the werewolves by exploring the power of physical urges and unwanted attractions that both complicate the lives of those investigating the murder because of their awkward sexual tensions toward each other and add multiplicities to the motivations for the murder as well, because all too often, murders are related to sexual tensions.

Melissa Yi’s Wolf Ice puts a new spin on the current fascination with CSI shows by inviting us into a hair-raising adventure.

You can discover more about Melissa Yi (Melissa Yuan-Innes) on her website at www.melissayauninnes.com