This is book 2 in the National Parks Thriller series. It is a police procedural thriller with interesting historical information about national parks mixed in.
I read both books. I do feel like it is best to read them in order but also feel like you can read the 2nd book as a standalone snd be totally fine understanding the story.
Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for allowing me to read this ARC

Lots of action and suspense with well written characters. It did take longer than I expected for the storylines to converge. I really enjoyed learning about the locations, the science and especially the Tlingit culture. I found it added a lot to the story. I am definitely looking forward to the next book in this series.

The idea of a thriller involving national parks seemed like a winner to me. I was hoping the second book in the series was going to win me over, but it unfortunately did not. I was close to DNFing the book, but stuck with it.
We followed FBI special investigator Gina Delgado, who is now directly assisting the President, and National Park Service investigator Michael Walker discover that they might be working cases that are connected to the melting of the glaciers releasing prehistoric organisms that could cause another extinction.
There was certainly a lot of action and fast paced situations. But there was also (what felt like) mansplaining and government acronyms that it distracted from the storyline. While I love a good thriller, this is not a series I will continue. I could potentially watch it as a tv series though.

Cold Burn was not my typical type of book, but I am so glad that I gave it a try. This story takes place in Everglades National Park and Glacier Bay National Park. FBI and national park agents work together to solve some mysterious deaths. The deaths in both parks are linked, even though they are thousands of miles apart. The deaths are tied to an even bigger plan to cause mass destruction. Will the agents be able to stop the attacks in time?

Thank you NetGalley for the advanced copy of this title for review.

I really enjoyed the multiple perspectives that this book is told from. Michael Walker is an investigator with the National Park Service, he is in Alaska where he is sent from one case involving people stealing artifacts from from museums to a different part of the state where a group of scientists has gone missing during a hike. The common factor linking these cases is that both involve the Tlingit community, a group of remote Native people, who keep to themselves and do not trust outsiders.

In Florida, we meet Gina Delgado. She is investigating the murder of a scientist intern, who is helping a team perform experiments in the Everglades National Park. Just as it seems like she is getting somewhere with her investigation, she is sent to a different spot - that of a vessel. The bodies of the crew who were onboard have been recovered, but all were dead.

It is up to Walker & Delgado to work "together" via phone calls, messages, and whatever other form of communication they can think of in order to find the connection between these cases and solve them. As they race to solve their cases, they are also battling present-day, power-hungry men who will stop at nothing in order to see their own goals become reality.

A.J. Landau's Cold Burn follows Leave No Trace as the second in a National Parks thriller series. The lead is National Park Service Special Agent Michael Walker, who has a prosthetic for his left foot. FBI special investigator Gina Delgado also works with him once again.

This one opens in Glacier Bay National Park, Alaska, where a geological survey team runs from an avalanche and encounters something worse. Michael is sent to Glacier Bay. Also, a nuclear submarine in Icy Strait, Alaska, is damaged by a World War II mine and transmits a request for rescue.

FBI special investigator Gina Delgado is sent to Alaska as well. She and Michael are up against a deadly prehistoric organism re-emerging due to global warming, a rogue billionaire, and Russian assassins and commando teams.

What a thrilling novel! Although I have not read the first book in the National Parks Thriller series, I did not feel that it was too hard to catch up on the characters in this second installment.

As a thriller lover, I appreciated the different setting and characters from more traditional thrillers. Hard to put down, and gripping!

Many thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for my review copy. Highly recommend!

The action never stops in this second National Parks thriller from the authors that are A.J. Landau!

I was expecting Michael Walker and Gina Delgado’s presence as the major players of course. But, was thoroughly and pleasantly surprised when we get the bonus reappearance of several side characters from the first book ‘Leave No Trace.’

I also very much enjoy the ‘pulled from today’s headlines’ aspect of this series. A masterful interweaving of todays headlines and topics with a fictional America, and how these things play out.

In this novel we get global warming, glacial melting and permafrost melt along with the rights of indigenous communities, the perils of the ocean currents and the war in Ukraine. Combined with a fictional Russian coup attempt and a defrosted prehistoric killer bacterium. Throw in a billionaire Space Mogul’s drive to reach Mars and stolen indigenous artifacts and WOW! What a story!

Only niggle I had was exactly ‘how’ Gina Delgado escaped the Everglades and is the poor USGS head of researching Project Coldburn still wading around out there!?!

Cold Burn is the 2nd National Parks Thriller by A.J. Landau featuring National Park Service Investigator Michael Walker and FBI Special Investigator Gina Delgado.
As I started this one, I was wondering how are these settings, Alaska and the Everglades going to come together in this fast paced thriller? Well they did and the authors give the reader quite a thrill ride making this happen. This story has a lot of moving parts, threats to the future of the world and a plethora of cliffhangers.
Thank you to NetGalley, the author and the publisher for the ARC of this novel in exchange for my honest review.

The new National Parks thriller from A. J. Landau, Cold Burn, takes you from the Florida Everglades to the remote parts of Alaska.

Michael Walker is a National Park Service investigator tracking the smuggling of artifacts, many from Native Alaskans, when he's pulled off the case to go search for missing scientists in Glacier Bay National Park. Meanwhile, FBI Special Investigator Gina Delgado is looking into the seemingly random murder of an intern with the U.S. Geological Survey in Florida. It seems a low-profile case, but when you report only to the President, you go where they send you.

The link between the two cases, as well as a missing sub whose crew all died, may lie in a prehistoric organism. An organism that some view as the ultimate weapon and others as the ultimate power source. Walker and Delgado find themselves looking for the same answers in a race whose fate could decide the future of humanity.

Landau, the pseudonym of authors Jon Land and Jeff Ayers, have put together a fast-paced thriller with an exciting mystery at its core. It starts with a bang and sets off a chain of events that will have you flipping the pages. It's a nice mix of thrilling scenes, featuring chases and gunplay, a mystery rooted in nature, and an exploration of some of our national parks and their role in our ecosystem. The race against the clock nature keeps the tension high, with some deadly fights and heroic stands against both their enemies and mother nature.

The thrills run all through the book, with a little twist at the end that will whet your appetite for further adventures.

I was provided a copy of this book by the publisher.

In the 1960s, a popular children’s animated series featured the adventures of the fictional Yogi Bear, a picnic basket-filching ursine that lived in the fictional Jellystone National Park. Yogi’s chief adversary was the usually hapless Ranger Smith, who remained one step behind in his efforts to stop Yogi. That image of Ranger Smith haunted the Park Service for years, as children who watched the series became adults who viewed the rangers’ principal activities as relatively mundane functions, such as preventing forest fires, policing litterbugs, and catching poachers and illicit pot smokers. That image is now permanently shattered in A.J. Landau’s “Cold Burn,” a taut and timely thriller in which Park Service Agent Michael Walker investigates matters of top national security.

A. J. Landau is the pen name of authors Jon Land and Jeff Ayers, who have written two novels in the National Park Service thriller series. The series protagonist is Michael Walker, a special agent in the Service’s Investigative Services Branch, which is equivalent to the FBI. “Cold Burn” actually begins far from any National Park Service territory, in the Pacific Ocean off the Alaskan coast. There, a state-of-the-art Navy submarine sinks after a collision with a leftover World War II mine. But when a rescue team arrives to help the trapped submariners reach safety, they find instead that the crew members have all frozen to death from the inside out in the sub’s temperature-controlled environment.

While this is happening in the ocean near Alaska, FBI special agent Gina Delgado (who also appeared with Walker in the first novel in this series) is investigating another mysterious death half a continent away. An intern on a United States Geological Service research project in the Everglades was stabbed to death, and his body was dumped in the swamp. Delgado discovers the dead intern’s identification is fake and that the killers are professionals. As she investigates, Walker is looking into the theft of Native American artifacts from various Alaskan museums. He catches the thieves in the act, but before he can apprehend them, another professional killer murders the thieves and steals their haul.

Anyone who has ever read a thriller like “Cold Burn” knows that seemingly unrelated incidents happening vast distances apart are often connected, and that’s the case here. I won’t reveal any more details except to say that the cases become far more important than isolated thefts and murders. Walker’s investigation eventually takes him to remote Lester Island (an actual location) in Alaska, where he finds some answers deep inside abandoned mines on the island. The island is home to the Tlingit tribe, several of whom figure into the book’s climactic action. Amka Reynolds, a tribal member with a doctorate from MIT, becomes Walker’s right-hand and a source of scientific explanations in the book.

The authors extensively researched “Cold Burn,” and the book has many historical and scientific references. They avoid lengthy information dumps and acronym-filled technobabble. Instead, their explanations are usually relevant, brief, and helpful to readers in understanding the plot. For example, in the opening chapters, a salvage trawler under contract with the U.S. Navy found and raised a mine that had sunk to the bottom of the ocean. I was unaware these salvage operations existed and was fascinated by the authors’ description of the process. This operation wasn’t extraneous filler, either; the submarine struck the mine being raised, leading to the tragedy that unfolded.

The authors do a good job of character development within the structure of a thriller. Michael Walker is a complex hero, as he’s still trying to fully process the death of his wife a few years earlier in an incident that led to the amputation of his foot. (The damage his prosthetic replacement foot suffers during the book puts Walker in acute danger a few times and adds to the overall suspense.) He also slowly develops a friendship with Amka, one that may lead to romance in future books in the series. “Cold Burn” has several colorful villains as well. The most noteworthy “big bad” is a sadistic multi-billionaire who was clearly patterned after Elon Musk.

I had a few problems with the authors’ stylistic decisions in “Cold Burn.” They had an annoying habit of ending a chapter on a seeming cliffhanger that proves to be quite innocuous when explained in a subsequent chapter. For example, at the end of one chapter, Delgado and her assistant were watching surveillance footage of a suspect when she noticed something in the suspect’s pocket. They reacted in shock at her discovery. Readers must wait five chapters to learn the mysterious object wasn’t the code for the nuclear football or any similar classified information. Instead, it was a local department store clothing tag that provided a further clue to the suspect’s whereabouts. The authors also include trivial snippets at the start of each chapter. Although not always relevant to the story, this trivia is usually interesting. However, some factoids, such as the mention that Lester Island was the site of a beetle infestation in 1979, were head-scratchers.

The authors also discuss the history of Lester Island, where the natives fought off an invading Russian army in the early 1800s. This discussion of little-known historical events was illuminating and led to a greater appreciation of the local culture (as the authors intended). Unfortunately, the authors take their admiration for the culture too far and introduce some supernatural elements into the story, as when Amka’s grandfather, a supposed shaman, brings about abrupt changes in the winter weather. These paranormal events contrasted sharply with the book’s overall scientific atmosphere.

“Cold Burn” effectively combines ingenious police investigation, suspenseful action set pieces, and high-level political intrigue. The authors combine several storylines thousands of miles apart in a way that’s easy to follow. They also have a likable, offbeat, well-rounded protagonist and some enjoyably detestable villains. The extensive research that finds its way into the storyline can sometimes go overboard, and some of the authors’ efforts to artificially enhance suspense are unnecessary and annoying. However, suspense fans should enjoy a different type of hero in a different kind of thriller.

NOTE: The publisher graciously provided me with a copy of this book through NetGalley. However, the decision to review the book and the contents of this review are entirely my own.

It took me a long time to get through this book. This was primarily due to all the technical information in the story. It felt like I'd never finish the story. It was full of action, drama, terrorists, chemical warfare, etc. Sometimes there is too much in a story that it makes the reader struggle to stay vested in finishing the book. I liked the last couple of chapter the best. At the start when there was 3 separate stories all happening at the same time, it was a tad confusing. Later there's explanations on how the three situations all relate to each other. My favorite characters were Michael, Gina and Amka. I would have enjoyed it more with less technical stuff and more storyline.

This book is totally different from the 1st book in this series. The format & subject reminds me strongly of the James Rollins books. It was a bit hard to get into as it keeps switching locations & storylines. it’s definitely worth sticking with it though, when everything starts to converge. I’d really like to know more about the 2 veterans toward the end. What’s they’re story?

COLD BURN is the second in the A.J. Landau National Parks Thriller series, and it is just as good as the first, LEAVE NO TRACE. In both books, the series name with its plural "parks" is appropriate given the multiple settings. This time around, the book's action moves from Alaska to New Orleans to Fishers Island in New York to the Everglades, and even underwater to a nuclear submarine, immersing us in each of the settings with descriptive and evocative language.

The series' author, A.J.Landau, is actually a pseudonym for two writers (Jon Land and Jeff Ayers). This works well, since there are two main characters, each of whom is quite distinct and, I'm guessing, written mainly by one or other of the authors. On the one hand, Michael Walker is a special agent for the National Park Service Investigative Services Branch (ISB) while on the other, Gina Delgado is in a unique position as an investigator reporting directly to the president of the United States. In COLD BURN, they are working on two separate investigations which the reader can be sure will merge into one.

As the book begins, Walker is in Alaska, attempting to catch a ring of thieves who have been stealing Tlingit artifacts from Sitka National Historic Park when he is sent to find a missing geological team after an avalanche in Glacier Bay National Park Preserve. Delgado is in Florida, at Everglades National Park, looking into the death of a geologist whose body has been found under unusual circumstances. Aspects of both investigations dovetail with findings from a submarine debacle and the plans of a megabillionaire intent on becoming the world's first trillionaire. The action is fast and furious, in short chapters, moving quickly from one location and event to another. The reader is often put on hold as the action flips between characters, but it cycles back around so quickly that we don't lose interest but rather read on to find out what happened next. The end result is a book that is hard to put down.

This is not to say, however, that the characters are given short shrift. Walker and Delgado are both fully developed, as are several of the secondary characters. In particular, the Tlingit biologist, Amka, who works with Walker, is fully developed both as an individual and as a representation of the Tlingit culture that plays a major role in the Alaskan sections of the book. These sections allow the authors to inform us of the history and culture of the Tlingit people as well as the marginalization of native peoples performed by the US govenment when many of the national parks were created. In both Walker's and Delgado's sections, we learn a great deal of geologic and biologic science, as well. As the two threads of the novel are woven together with the submarine disaster and the billionaire's acquisitive actions, at times the science is fascinating and sometimes repetitive.

For much of the book, the action takes precedence and the writing becomes transparent - almost as if it were streaming directly from the page to the reader's brain's imagery. However, at moments the writing becomes so beautiful that I just had to slow down to appreciate it. This was especially true in the descriptions of Alaskan snow and ice storms. I enjoyed the entire book, but found Walker's sections, which provided cultural and geological background, more engaging than Delgado's sections, which had more of a political underpinning.

The conclusion of the book sets up changes that may occur in the next in the series while also providing a very gratifying resolution to the action of this book. There is no need to have read the first in the series before reading COLD BURN since this book functions well as a standalone. Having read the first, however, I find this a stronger book and one that continues the story of Walker and Delgado very well.

I often read the synopsis of books when I request them and then forget what it’s about, preferring just to know that it sounded good to me. When I requested this one, I knew I loved the first one and I was excited to see what happened next. I just so happened to start this one on my way to Alaska and a trip to Glacier Bay National Park, on a Holland America ship, though not the same one mentioned in the book. It made it that much more real for me and I couldn’t help but think about pivotal scenes as I wandered the ship and cruised Glacier Bay. The story itself was fast-paced and thrilling, keeping me glued to the pages as I moved through it, wondering how they could top the latest scene. I love science but am not the best at it but it was explained well so I could follow the theories presented. The characters are well-developed and likeable, particularly Michael and Gina. Highly recommend the series if you love action books with a national parks background.

I like these National Parks books. They are full of mystery, suspense and thrilling adventures. Very fast moving, with great character relationships, they are the perfect escape from real life for a few hours. I also love the history and trivia about the parks and events that the author has included. I got a bit lost in all the science in this installment, but enjoyed it overall!

So much action! This book is non stop suspenseful story lines! Once I started reading, I couldn’t put it down. I felt the same way about the first in the series, but also want to point out that this could be read without reading the first book and still be enjoyable. The national park facts and information during the story itself are incredibly interesting. As someone who appreciates nature I am adding these parks to my list of places I’d like to go! I’d recommended this book for anyone who likes suspense, thriller or action. This book could also be a great fit for anyone interested in our environment, parks or government. I can’t wait to read what happens next with the main two characters from this series! I would love to discuss the ending with other readers, all I can say is wow!

Three and a half stars. This novel's very complex with settings in a myriad of locations. There are also numerous story lines and characters. the action is tense as the narrators try to find a microbe that is destroying life as we know it. The problem put Agent Gina Delgado and Micheal Walker who is part of the National Parks police force to use every bit of their expertise. This thriller will have you turning pages as fast as you can. In the end, they find a way to solve the crisis. But they realize at that any time another crisis will occur.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for my e-galley.

3 out of 5 stars – Dense but Enjoyable

Thanks to NetGalley for the ARC! Cold Burn wasn’t quite the action-packed read I expected, but it was definitely packed with information. Multiple storylines and locations eventually came together, but it was a challenge to keep track. I appreciated the lack of heavy scenery descriptions, but the dense narrative made this more of a slow, piece-by-piece read than a binge for me. Still enjoyable—just a bit much at times.

The setting of this was so real it was scary! I felt like I was there too which made it all that scarier!