Perfect pacing. PERFECT pacing. Due to the techniques of art, it's clear from the get go who the major suspect is, but there are enough twists for lovers of suspense that nothing is entirely predictable. A masterful murder mystery in graphic form.

I never felt like Rucka short-changed the character of Marshal Carrie Stetko, that she was a fully developed person, even if guarded, and the reader didn't get to see the whole of her. There was the sense she was there, just beyond the covers of the book. I also deeply enjoyed how Stetko wasn't a woman at the pole, but a just a damned person doing her job, dealing with her past, and surviving. Her sex is a thing she must contend with, as life on Antarctica is male-dominated, but Rucka handles this well, neither making a point of it, nor discounting it. That is a difficult thing to manage.