Book Review: ‘Black Ice’ by Becca Fitzpatrick

Chance meetings can be just that, meeting someone at a point of time and never seeing them again. Yet there are also encounters that bring fast friendships, or even danger.

In Black Ice by Becca Fitzpatrick, Lauren Huntsman has a chance encounter that changes her life. No one knows where she has gone, and her family is horrified. Yet she is not the only young woman to have gone missing.

Britt Pfeiffer is not worried about some random disappearances. As her class decides to take its break in Hawaii, Britt talks her friend Korbie into backpacking with her in the Teton Range instead. Korbie’s brother Calvin was Britt’s boyfriend, but he suddenly dropped her with no explanation. Korbie doesn’t know what happened, but when she agrees to the trek, Calvin also decides he wants to tag along. Calvin is very experienced in the outdoors, while Britt has only done more rudimentary training. Unsure of how they feel about this unexpected situation, Britt and Korbie agree to meet him at their destination.

Wondering if she can figure out what happened and determined to rekindle their relationship, Britt sees her plans go awry when she and Korbie get stuck on their way up the mountain. Knowing that Calvin is on his way, they are not so much afraid of being on their own, as that they might freeze before he reaches them. Just as they are beginning to lose heart, they stumble on a cabin, where two young men agree to help them. The men seem nice and it doesn’t hurt that they are good-looking. That is until the gun comes out. Suddenly the girls understand the dangers of the mountain in a new way.

Britt knows that Calvin is on his way and will save them. But stumbling upon a body in a hidden trunk, she begins to understand that she and Korbie are in way over their heads. The description of one of the missing girls’ clothing matches the clothes on the corpse. Can they survive long enough for Calvin to find them?

Fitzpatrick has given us characters that seem quite real, and the mistakes they make on the way, while a bit sophomoric, seems to fit in with the character and age of the girls. On the surface Calvin seems like the knight in shining armor, but there is something wrong that you can sense from the beginning. Yet Britt has stars in her eyes and misses the strangeness noticeable to the reader.

The beauty of the wilderness shows through as well as the dangers of the weather and the terrain. That they trust, in such a setting, in someone unknown only shows how desperate and afraid the young women were on their own. Letting down their guard in the most inappropriate situation has put them in danger.

This work takes you into the darkness of a killer’s mind, but the red herrings have you guessing and wondering what is really happening. There is a chilling secret that slowly peels away, revealing the truth about who can be trusted.

If you enjoy mystery, suspense, and romance you will find this a great read. The danger and beauty create a haunting mystery that even as the truth is revealed stays with you long after the book is done.