The Ursulina is a prequel to the Deep, Deep Snow; yet a story that could not be told first.

The reader may not have grasped what was going on in the first couple of pages, but they catch on quickly. By midway, the story was beginning to lag, but then you realized Brian Freeman was letting you catch your breath, much like the top of the roller-coaster, before all heck breaks loose and you are in for a ride, and a conclusion, you hadn’t anticipated.

Brian Freeman is adept at sudden left turns. In retrospect, the clues might have been there, but he was one step ahead, leading you towards a path well-traveled, knowing all along you were with him one hundred percent and he was going to zing you with your gullibility.

Wow! Just like the first in this series I did not see the ending coming. It is a prequel to the Deep Deep Snow the first She.by Lake book. This is the story of the Ursulina a brutual murderer perhaps creature. One killing happened many years ago but suddenly the Ursulina is back. Detective Rebeca Colder is on the case as she also deals with her own personal crisis with her marriage.
Gripping story
4.5 rounded up.
I was given a copy from Netgalley in exchange for an unbiased review.

** spoiler alert ** Brian Freeman has written books which I call, about my home in Minnesota. Although this is about a copper mine and is truly different kind of book, I can see glimpses of my youth in this book. From the ghost stories that we would tell at outings to the horror on TV. These kind of tales seem to permeate the basic life that we lead. Brian's story starts out with a 10 year old seeing a glimpse of a 7 foot shaggy orange-brown beast which they called an Ursulina. She was about twenty when she was taking pictures of men near a trailer and then was abused physically by them and then by the time she was twenty-six she was working for the police. Needless to say she was happy in her job until a lawyer came back into town and reopened her wound. Her marriage was on the rocks and was in shambles. Many things happen and other people were mysteriously killed by a monster. Several things change and the 10 year old has grown into a women who is talking to her daughter. If you follow the dialog you might like what comes out of it.

If you haven’t ever read Brian Freeman I highly recommend him. This was one good book. I was afraid the main character was the bad guy. I was so hoping i wasn’t right! A very good book with so much suspense. You know it is a good book when you can’t stop thinking about it.

This was a spectacular story. Beautifully slow build up to get you all invested in the mystery and in each of the characters' stories. I enjoyed this book from beginning to end, and what an end! I had to read again and again the part where the mystery is revealed because it was so surprising, shocking and unexpected, just the way I like my thrillers!. One of my favorite books ever read. Thank you so much to NetGalley, publisher and author, for allowing me to read this amazing book for free .

Well...I am not sure what was going on here. This book was all over the place, almost as if several writers mashed up a story. Part fairy tale, part love letter, part murderous rage. There was over drawn dramatic romantic musings that really just made me cringe. The police work seemed a bit flat compared to Freeman's other characters of Jonathon Stride and Cab Bolton. Unfortunately this was just a Medicare book that didn't have any shine to it.

The Ursulina is not my favorite Brian Freeman novel. I'm not into those strange creatures in the woods, but in Ursulina, Freeman does take us out of the woods into the town of Random. Here we see the sheriff's department in all its faults, along with a host of characters, some of whom meet their demise by the end of the novel. But it remains the Ursulina as the mystical figure, and Freeman's choice of unwrapping this mystery left me deeply disappointed.
Tanks NetGalley for the ARC.

Thanks to Netgalley and Blackstone Publishing for providing this arc in exchange for an honest review.

Several people have been murdered over the years in a small Wisconsin town. Many believe there is a monster in the woods, named the Ursulina, that is responsible for the deaths. Rebecca is the lone female cop in the town and she investigates the most recent murder, while dealing with an abusive husband and sexism in the 80’s.

Brian Freeman is in my top 5 favorite authors. I love the Stride series the most and I love everything else a little bit less. This was a good book but not my favorite. Maybe because it was set in the 80’s or maybe because it just wasn’t a Stride book, I’m not really sure, but I definitely look forward to his next book.

In Black Wolf County lies the insular mining town of Random where Rebecca Colder works as a young sheriff’s deputy. In the midst of a legal battle against the mine, a grisly murder takes place. A body torn to shreds, "I am the Ursulina" written in blood, exactly like a double murder that occurred several years back. Rebecca must piece together the clues to find a killer before they strike again.

The Ursulina is a thrilling murder mystery which ties into the previous novel The Deep, Deep Snow. After reading the previous novel I was hoping there would be a continuation of Shelby's story. This novel is a prequel or I guess I would call it an origin story of Deputy Shelby Lake (The Deep Deep Snow) in which the novel is told by her mother Rebecca Colder. Random is a mining town, also known for the Ursulina (Big Foot), which is in the middle of a tense legal battle between the mine and the women workers. A grisly murder made to look like an Ursulina attack begins a search for what appears to be a serial killer. There is a lot going on in this novel and there are some sensitive topics involving sexual harassment, rape, abuse, etc. I was excited to discover more about Shelby's mysterious back story and understand her mother Rebecca's motives. This was an exciting novel with a shocking ending that I didn't see coming…a must read!

The followup to The Deep Deep Snow is intriguing from the Title to the final word. As my favorite author, I have come to sense more of his reveals but he packed this story with quality suspense and emotion that left me with pause and reflection. This book might be his best since his first release and my all-time favorite IMMORAL.

Released as an Audible Original, the narration by January Lavoy is pure perfection!

Another great book by Brian Freeman. This is a prequel to The Deep, Deep Snow. The book follows Shelby Lake’s (heroine of The Deep, Deep Snow) mom, Rebecca Colder. It is centered around the origins of the ursulina, the mythical beast who roams the woods. While it sounds a little hokey, it isn’t. What you get with The Ursulina, it a gritty murder mystery set in the beautiful Northwoods.

I felt the story started a little slow, but it more than made up for it by the end. Of course this story also contains a patented twist from Mr. Freeman. The twists Mr. Freeman comes up with make all of his books must reads, and The Ursulina is no exception. He also did a great job developing the characters in this book. It was really easy to root for Rebecca, and you really felt like you got to know the main characters. This book was easy to get into, and I found that it was hard to put down once I started reading.

I’m interested to see where Mr. Freeman takes this series from here. I’ll be sure to pick up the next book in the series when it is available.

Wow! I was not expecting to like this book enough to give it 5 stars. Brian Freeman has never let me down in the past and he sure didn’t this time. Filled with emotion, excitement and a hint of the supernatural,(think Bigfoot), and you have a story that is really an edge of your seat thriller.

Need I say something about the ending? Oh no, I’ll leave that surprise for the reader to discover.

Definitely put this one of your to read list!

Well-written story in which the setting is as much a character as the people living and telling the story. The isolation, the cold, the company town, and the myth all contribute to the mystery in the tale told by Rebecca.

The Ursulina is a follow up and a prequel to Freeman’s 2019 novel, the Deep, Deep Snow, which featured Deputy Sheriff Shelby Lake, who had been abandoned by her mother as an infant and raised by the Sheriff. Here, we get an origins tale told in a narrative to Shelby by her mother, explaining what happened. The stories are thus interconnected, but otherwise entirely separate.

This is the tale of Deputy Rebecca Colder of the Town of Random in Black Wolf County, a small northern Minnesota mining town, a generation earlier when it was not as common for women to serve as deputy sheriffs or to work in the mines. It is a quaint small town where everyone knows each other’s business, but it’s also A town of sexual harassment, domestic violence, marital strife, infidelity, and grudges going back to high school.

And, of course, there’s the legend of the Ursulina, a beast of the woods, seven feet tall, with claws like a giant wolverine, and there have been few sightings of this fell beast. Rebecca though as a child once saw him in the woods and another local made his living making true life documentaries about the beast. Several killings were attributed to the beast with bodies ripped asunder by giant claws till their organs spilled out.

It’s at once a horror movie and a domestic violence take and a murder mystery when Rebecca finds another victim of the Ursulina. The story is about Rebecca, told through her eyes, to her child, Shelby. It will keep you reading right to the end when things go in a direction you’ll probably not anticipate. Well-written, well told, worth reading.