Chinook is a nice little town somewhere in the American Northwest up by the Canadian border where it doesn't appear anything much untoward would ever happen. In fact it looks like the perfect place for an ex-cop to recover from the rigours of the job and start up a second career as a professional photographer.

It's not an easy living, there not being much call for artistic shots in the Ansel Adams mode from the locals, but his early retirement pension and the occasional sale to a tourist has allowed Thumps DreadfulWater to establish a life for himself, including a circle of friends and a sort of relationship with the head of the local tribal council.

He's also still on the periphery of police work, being utilized by the local sheriff to take photographs of any crime scenes where the service is required. There's a nice symmetry to that considering it was a crime scene photographer who taught Thumps everything he knows about cameras and the art of taking pictures. Viewing life through the lens of a camera isn’t a means of removing himself from the picture, more a matter of helping to frame things so he can keep a handle on them.

Everything is OK in an "if it ain't broke don't fix it" sort of way until the first body turns up at the new resort/condominium/casino complex that the local tribe has built. Thumps wouldn't have been any more involved than taking pictures if not for the problem that the son of his part-time girlfriend Claire, who as tribal council head been instrumental in setting up the project, turns out to be the major suspect in the case.

In a fit of adolescent pique, Stick Merchant, Claire's son, had decided that casinos and Natives don't mix and had headed up the protests against its construction. When he disappears after the body has been found, he becomes the object of the sheriff's interest. When he's still missing and a second body turns up, killed by the same weapon, the sheriff is becomes a lot more interested and Claire asks Thumps to go looking for her boy.

DreadfulWater Shows Up is Canadian author Thomas King's first foray into the field of crime fiction (he's using the name of Hartley GoodWeather for the series, but since his real name is splashed all over the cover and Hartley is a poor second-line credit, it's not much of a pen name) and the switch in genres hasn't caused him to stint in the application of his writing skills. All the elements that a fan has come to expect from a Thomas King novel are in full attendance and ensure this isn't just some run-of-the-mill mystery story.