Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    An Ice Cold Grave
    An Ice Cold Grave
    An Ice Cold Grave
    Audiobook8 hours

    An Ice Cold Grave

    Written by Charlaine Harris

    Narrated by Alyssa Bresnahan

    4/5

    ()

    About this audiobook

    New York Times best-selling author Charlaine Harris is a fan favorite for her Sookie Stackhouse mysteries as well as this series starring supernatural detective Harper Connelly. Called to tiny Doraville, North Carolina, Harper investigates the disappearance of several young boys. After finding them buried in a secluded wood, it becomes clear that a sadistic serial killer is stalking the town's children.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherRecorded Books, Inc.
    Release dateNov 26, 2007
    ISBN9781436125710
    An Ice Cold Grave
    Author

    Charlaine Harris

    Charlaine Harris is a New York Times bestselling author who has been writing for over thirty years. She was born and raised in the Mississippi River Delta area. She has written four series, and two stand-alone novels, in addition to numerous short stories, novellas, and graphic novels (cowritten with Christopher Golden). Her Sookie Stackhouse books have appeared in twenty-five different languages and on many bestseller lists. They’re also the basis of the HBO series True Blood. Harris now lives in Texas, and when she is not writing her own books, she reads omnivorously. Her house is full of rescue dogs.

    More audiobooks from Charlaine Harris

    Related to An Ice Cold Grave

    Titles in the series (4)

    View More
    View More

    Related audiobooks

    Mystery For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      Cricket League

      Sep 1, 2022

      First prize 10 and under Tang Li, age 9 Palmetto Bay, FL My name is Anisa. I was in Hawaii on vacation. I enjoyed sipping refreshing drinks, overlooking the turquoise ocean, and dancing with others, before I overheard that the priceless Fire Ring wa

      10 min read

    • Article

      Lost And Found

      Dec 5, 2021

      Lost And Found
      9 min read

    • Article

      Begin Again

      Jun 14, 2022

      My grandfather came to live with me. There was nowhere else for him to go. What had happened to all his children? Death, decay, exile—I hardly know. My own parents died of pain. But I must not be too gloomy, at the beginning, or you will leave me, an

      6 min read

    • Article

      The Man I Should Have Married

      Dec 29, 2019

      The Man I Should Have Married
      11 min read

    • Article

      Book Extract

      Jan 20, 2020

      My year off was also interesting, in that I didn’t feel any less loved, or cherished, or wanted. Why? Because my life is already rich with soulmates, and I got the chance to behold that. You don’t have to shag someone for them to be a soulmate. We do

      7 min read

    • Article

      Pulling Up Azaleas

      Jan 10, 2023

      Throughout their lives, women are showered with bouquets of roses on numerous splendid occasions. But men? They’re only given flowers at their funeral. It’s a harsh world for men, as our lives tend to go unappreciated until death. Such was the case a

      22 min read

    • Article

      Speedboat

      Mar 24, 2022

      Nobody died that year. Nobody prospered. There were no births or marriages. Seventeen reverent satires were written – disrupting a cliché and, presumably, creating a genre. That was a dream, of course, but many of the most important things, I fi nd,

      14 min read

    • Article

      The Lives of Bryan

      Jun 1, 2023

      The Lives of Bryan
      19 min read

    • Article

      G’day – And Goodbye

      Aug 25, 2021

      G’day – And Goodbye
      4 min read

    • Article

      Let The Bones Talk

      Jun 16, 2021

      Let The Bones Talk
      6 min read

    • Article

      Let The Bones Talk

      Jun 16, 2021

      Let The Bones Talk
      6 min read

    • Article

      It Happened to Me…

      Feb 25, 2021

      My sister and I have always been fans of spooky and unnerving stories, and particularly those associated with Devon and Dartmoor, our favourite holiday destination as kids. We both, therefore, knew the ‘Devil’s Hoofprints’ story better than any other

      4 min read

    • Article

      Above Santa Cruz

      Jul 2, 2019

      Above Santa Cruz
      5 min read

    • Article

      It Happened to Me…

      Sep 7, 2023

      It Happened to Me…
      8 min read

    • Article

      The Wanders: When home is not a haven.

      Jul 25, 2013

      The job in the North was a good job for what it was. I was not excited about it, but I was satisfied because it would take me away from the city where I had lived with Paul, and where every drugstore and bar and credit center was heavy with the memor

      13 min read

    • Article

      A Year in Reading: Tim Lane

      Dec 8, 2021

      We stopped at the Topaz Internment Camp, where my wife’s family was held during World War II, near the tiny town of Delta, Utah. We found the apocalyptic remnants of one of our country’s great shames. The post A Year in Reading: Tim Lane appeared fi

      7 min read

    • Article

      Righteous

      Jan 22, 2019

      Righteous
      8 min read

    • Article

      Life After Death

      May 27, 2022

      Life After Death
      14 min read

    • Article

      Cricket League

      Sep 1, 2020

      Cricket League
      7 min read

    • Article

      Bloodlines and Bitter Syrup

      Sep 1, 2020

      Bloodlines and Bitter Syrup
      18 min read

    • Article

      Pleasure Palace

      Sep 1, 2022

      Pleasure Palace
      15 min read

    • Article

      The Boy Who Cried Wolf

      Jun 9, 2020

      Josh Turner from Austin, Texas The egg landed with a splat on the truck window. ‘Bullseye,’ grinned my buddy Dave*. Hiding in the shadows, as the car drove past, we could see the driver gesticulating furiously. It was 31 October 1990 – Halloween – a

      4 min read

    • Article

      Too Much Seinfeld

      Nov 30, 2017

      Too Much Seinfeld
      8 min read

    • Article

      Letters

      Apr 23, 2021

      I’M WRITING this the morning after a sleepless night. I was up thinking of the flames racing across Table Mountain. It had destroyed historic buildings, priceless documents and parts of one of SA’s most famous universities. It also resulted in the in

      3 min read

    Related categories

    Reviews for An Ice Cold Grave

    4/5

    80 ratings39 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

    • 5/5
      Excellent! Her best yet! Sookie Stackhouse helps a rural town discover what happened to missing teenage boys. A very fast read
    • 3/5
      The third book in the Harper Connelly series, it was a fun, quick read. Harper was struck by lightening & now can find dead people. She can tell how they died, but that's it. This time she runs into a serial killing & a lot of trouble. Kind of predictable overall, the details were fun to read. There are some added twists & turns to the plot that were fun.I'd give this book 4 stars, just because it was such a fun, quick & relaxing read, but Harris just annoys me by constantly bringing up Harper's past. Yes, I know it defines her, but quit beating me over the head with it! There are entire paragraphs of self-pity that I continually have to skip over. She could reference it in a few words, a sentence at the most, but no! She has to recap it again & again. Not only have we read it in previous books, but also in this one! Enough already!!!Still, I want to read the next one. Her works are like chips. They're not all that filling & I can't seem to put them down. I have to read just one more....
    • 4/5
      Boys have been disappearing in a small North Carolina community. But local law enforcement always seems to have a logical reason for their disappearances. Finally, a family member hires Harper Connelly to search for a missing boy. Harper is a young woman who,since being struck by lightning, is able to locate dead bodies and tell what they died of. She travels with her stepbrother Tolliver. Harper finds quite a bit more than anyone bargained for in this extremely chilling tale, third in a series. Her personal life also becomes very interesting. Charlaine Harris's series are all different and all excellent, and this new one is no exception. Highly recommended.
    • 2/5
      I'm not sure what to make of this book. I liked the plot and story and the mess that Harper got herself into.I did not like the relationship between Harper and Tolliver and skipped all the sex scenes because...If you are raised in a blended household as brother and sister, you are brother and sister... a relationship develops within those parameters. Adopted children don't have intimate relations with their adopted siblings, do they? Then why should this be different for step-siblings? It's no different than thinking it's okay for a step-father to enter a sexual relationship with an adult step-child? In my book, that's not acceptable.And it's not as if they didn't see each other as siblings... that's exactly what they considered themselves to be.Bah... I'm almost disgusted enough to not read any more of Harris' stuff... not quite, but almost.
    • 5/5
      Harper and Tolliver ride again!In this installment, they have been summoned to a small North Carolina town where young men have been disappearing for several years. Harper discovers the grave sites almost immediately, but is attacked in the parking lot of their hotel afterwards, and the police feel certain that the killer is after her.Wacky psychic Xzylda and her grandson Manfred make a guest appearance, and much is revealed before Harper solves the crime.
    • 5/5
      Hired to find the bodies of five missing teenagers in a small Appalachian town, Harper does just that. And two more. Unable to prove Harper and Tolliver have any previous ties, local law enforcement would be just as happy to see the pair leave town, but the killer has other ideas...Full of twists and turns and the "time of ice" predicted in Grave Surprise, this series just keeps getting better.
    • 4/5
      What an interesting installment in the series! I enjoyed the western North Carolina setting, and the serial kidnapper/killer thing was pretty different from the story lines in Grave Surprise and Grave Sight. I was most suprised in the change in the dynamics of the relationship between Harper and Tolliver; I picked up on it earlier than it happened in this book, but I'm intrigued that it happened this early in the series. (Obviously, I'm hoping there are several more books in the Harper Connelly series.)

      I think Harper exerted more independence in this book than she did in the first two books of the series. It bothered me that she seemed so emotionally dependent on Tolliver, especially in the first book of the series. I like Harper's character development.

      I enjoyed the addition of Xylda the psychic and grandson Manfred, and I wonder if Manfred will continue to make appearances in future books, especially since he picked up on the change in Harper and Tolliver's relationship.

      I'm looking forward to the next book in the series!
    • 4/5
      This story follows Harper (who can 'see' in her mind where bodies are buried and how those bodies came to be...well dead bodies) and her 'brother' and manager Tolliver. Some things shift in this novel, including her relationship with her brother, who really isn't her brother. Also, the murder case is intriguing. At times its grisly, and Charlaine Harris doesn't shy away from some of the more heart wrenching aspects of the case. The deaths focus on young to teenage boys and the torture they endured before dying. Harper for some reason is more compelled by these deaths than any of her previous ones and vows to find out who killed them. She has a theory that she has to try to get the sheriff to belive. There is plenty of intrigue, thrills, and horror to this volume, but its also heavier on the romance side of things than the previous books. Still very worth a quick read.
    • 5/5
      LOVE this book. The mystery was disturbing, and although the culprit was found, you could never be call it justice and be happy. Charlaine Harris sometimes has a truly disturbing mind. But I should be thankful for her mind because of books like Ice Cold Grave.And finally Harper and Tolliver get together!!!
    • 4/5
      Another great read, but still leaning towards creepy...
    • 3/5
      This book was so much darker than the previous two. I wasn't expecting that.
    • 4/5
      I find Harper and Tolliver to be rather interesting protagonists — two people just trying to make a living from an unusual gift and keep to themselves, but who keep getting pulled into other people’s affairs. In this case, the discovery of a serial killer, an attack on Harper, and several other events all conspire to keep the two in Doraville much longer than they’d like. I’ve decided that this has been my favorite book of the three, maybe because we actually get a taste of a happy Harper in this one. Granted, her happiness comes from a realization of shared feelings between herself and her “brother”, but I had been told to expect it. I was afraid I might feel icky about their relationship, which appears incestuous from the outside, but by the time the book got to it I was prepared. Harper had already stopped thinking about him as her brother, so as a reader, I did too. I’m sad that this series hasn’t been continued yet, because I’m really interested to see how things continue for Harper and Tolliver.This is the first book in the series I listened to instead of read, so I wonder if the audio production is what made me enjoy it more? That is an interesting rumination for another time.
    • 4/5
      The third book in the Harper Connelly series gets us deeper into how Harper sees the world. She is a fascinating mix of fraility and bravery. It also deepens the understanding of the emotional cost of finding the dead. The dynamic of being an outsider in a small town also feels authentic. The writing remains taught and easy to read.
    • 4/5
      I really enjoy this series. It has a great quick pace, combined with an interesting plot line and quirky characters, it makes for a good time. Like each of the other books in the Harper Connelly series, the underlying premise is a bit dark, this time even more so, but the interesting addition of the heroines ability to find dead bodies, makes it a little more palatable. Combined that with a new twist in the primary relationship between the key characters, and it makes for a very interesting read.
    • 4/5
      I think with the third book, the Harper series has finally found its footing. Harper's cold, reserved character has finally started showing some emotion.Finished this one in a couple hours - really streamlined story that pulls you in. There's a tad more character development than previous installments (weird as it may be), and there is quite a bit more action after the local cops (as they invariably do) ask Harper and Tolliver to stay in town after the bodies are discovered.
    • 3/5
      This is book three of the Harper Connelly mystery series. Harper Connelly, aged 24, was struck by lightning when she was 15, and ever since then, has been able to sense the location of dead people by the "buzz" they emit and also determine the cause of death (but not who killed them). Consequently, she and her 27-year-old stepbrother, Tolliver Lang (acting as manager and assistant) hire themselves out by traveling around to help find missing persons, or as Harper says, to find “the silent witnesses” to what happened to them. In this book, the two travel to Doraville, North Carolina, near the coast. This makes the job particularly challenging for Harper:"The eastern seaboard is crammed with dead people. When work brings me to that part of America, the whole time I’m there it’s like wings of a huge flock of birds are fluttering inside my brain, never coming to rest. That gets old pretty quick.”Harper’s job, to find a missing boy, soon turns into a nightmare as she finds not one but eight bodies near an abandoned shack; bodies of boys that have been tortured and killed.Life is not all unpleasant for Harper, as she and Tolliver finally act upon their feelings for one another. Harper is determined to give Tolliver a special experience during their first times together:"In my limited experience, men were always so glad to get sex, they were pleased with it no matter how inexperienced their partner was. They weren’t there to run a critique group. They were there to have an orgasm. Provided you put their penis in the correct hole and made enthusiastic noises, they went away happy. It was like signing up for basic cable. That was what you’d sign up for if you were getting it for a person you didn’t know well. ... ‘For you, baby, HBO,’ I said, and made him moan.”Discussion: This series is so dark compared to Harris’s lighter and happier Sookie Stackhouse series. Harper is prone to uncomfortable physical aftereffects ever since the lightning strike, including depression. And this particular “episode,” with the torture and murder of a number of young boys, is almost reminiscent of Karin Slaughter’s work. Even the weather is minatory throughout. Yet there is still some humor, and still some of the supernatural. And this book even has sex! But even the sex seems less joyous than it should: Harper and Tolliver not only have grown up in the same family, but they rarely associate with anyone but each other: it seems “incestuous” even though it actually isn’t. You feel like telling them they should get out more!Evaluation: I really like Charlaine Harris, even though this series is not nearly as fun as the Sookie Stackhouse books. No matter how far her flights of supernatural fancy, she always manages to draw her characters in a complex way, and impart gems of observation about people into her plots.
    • 4/5
      Like any good mystery, I didn't want to put it down.
    • 5/5
      I seem to pretty much like whatever Charlaine Harris writes. But I believe the Harper Connelly books are my favorites. And this is the best of those.There was one plot point resolved in this book that I figured on from the first book. It was well foreshadowed and natural and fine, as far as I'm concerned.The specific plot of this book was well thought out and written carefully and well. I was suspicious of the ultimate bad guy from the first appearance and actually caught the final clue. (A very Agatha Christie kind of clue it is, too. Well done!) I rarely do that, as I don't try to figure out the mystery, and when I do I usually downgrade the book for it. But I don't in this case. She threw in enough red herrings, such as a whole other perp, to keep me not sure. In fact, when the first perp was revealed (which was a surprise to me) I wondered what she was going to do with the last quarter of the book! (One of the benefits of audiobooks is how very difficult it is to turn to the last page when temptation hits.) I call that well done. This is a very well written book that I happily recommend to mystery lovers.
    • 4/5
      Harper Connelly is drawn into another mystery, while looking for a boy's body she finds several and then is drawn into the mystery. The fundamental error that the murderer made was to attack her, making her stay in the town.It's interesting and Harper and Tolliver's relationship develops in this story. There were moments when the reasons why they were staying seemed to be more for the plot than reality.
    • 2/5
      I'll have to admit...despite the fact that Harper and Tolliver are not blood relations, I still feel a very high squick factor over the fact that their relationship got so...un-sibling-like...in this one, which tainted my enjoyment of the story as a whole.Still...Harris' writing is very strong, and the mystery (though predictable in the end) is pretty solid. I listened to the book-on-cd version of this one, and the voice actress who's doing this series does a really good job.Despite my qualms, I still look forward to the next in the series.
    • 3/5
      This was more grusome than I was expecting. I know that Harper Connelly finds dead people, but this time she finds 8 boys, who have been raped and tortured until they die. She and her step brother Tolliver also (finally?) change their relationship and move from family to lovers. I didn't get into it as much as I had previous books in the series. It was easy to read and I whizzed through it, but afterwards, there was no lingering glow, no rememberance of a great scene or line... The end tried to be suspenseful, but I knew that Harper was in no real danger (not going to kill the heroine off!) so instead of being riveting, it was more annoying.) This book just didn't quite work for me - it was like snacks - satisfying at the moment, but not enough to fill you up. I'll try the next one, but if it's not better, I'll let the series go.
    • 5/5
      I enjoy the Harper Connelly mysteries even better than the Sookie Stackhouse novels of Harris. This one continues to be interesting, engaging, and fascinating. I love the character of Harper, who can find dead bodies and tell what they've died from. I knew whodunnit pretty quickly, but I still devoured this quickly to see if I was right. The dynamics between Harper and other people is what keeps me coming back.
    • 4/5
      Well, Harris takes Tolliver and Harper's weird relationship to it's ultimate weird place, but somehow it works. I think the plot and Harper's relationship to her unusual talents were made excellent use of in this third entry into the series. Actually, I would say it is the best of the three. That said, I think some readers will have difficulty with the central relationship in the book. I still recommend it.
    • 4/5
      Title: Ice Cold GraveAuthor: Charlaine HarrisGenre: Mystery# of pages: 295Start date:04/04End date:04/07Borrowed/bought: borrowedMy rating of the book, F- [worst] to A [best]: B+Description of the book: Harper has a rare talent. In an accidental lightning strike when she was a teenager, Harper has the ability to sense dead people. With the help of Tolliver, her brother, Harper goes to solve another mystery. Harper is brought to small community in which several boys have been missing over the last few years. What Harper discovers is down right gruesome.Review: Harris has done it again with another fun series that is a playful mix of genres.Ok, If you are interested in what is happening between Harper and Tolliver, this book is for you. The subject matter was almost so gruesome that I may be taking a break from murder mysteries for a few days while I mellow out. I am interested to find out if Harper ever finds her sister but I am doubtful that will appear in the next book. If you ever want to know random out of date words from 60 years ago or southern usage this is the book for you. I actually learn new words from any Harris book I read.
    • 4/5
      Much better than her first two in this series
    • 4/5
      Lightning Struck Harper Connelly can now feel the energy of the dead, and the newer the stronger. Great new idea for a series by Charlaine Harris. I found this book refreshing with a great new storyline and entertaining characters.
    • 4/5
      I *really* like Harper Connelly. She's tough, smart, sarcastic and a complete realist. Who happens to find dead bodies for a living. This installment is really difficult - Harper is called in to find the bodies of five boys who've gone missing from a small town. When she finds them all in the same area, the terror, pain and torture the boys all suffered in their last moments causes Harper to pass out. Thus begins Harper's most trying case, as the boys' killer takes his fury out on Harper. She and her *not* brother, Tolliver, must help the town's sheriff discover the killer before he finishes Harper - or takes another boy.Super tense and very scary, this one kept me listening waaaay too late into the night, but I surely didn't mind!
    • 4/5
      For those who were creeped out by anything in Grave Sight or (more likely) Grave Secret, An Ice Cold Grave is not for you. The cover might tip you off, as you realize that there's not just the regular creepy skull, but red flags that suggest multiple points of interest (aka multiple bodies or pieces of bodies). Pretend Charlaine Harris only made it to two books in the series and the third one doesn't exist (and this probably goes for the fourth one, too). For those with a stronger constitution, An Ice Cold Grave will still creep you out, but probably only for the twisted abduction/murder story at the heart of everything as opposed to the Tolliver-Harper stuff. Harper has been booked in a small North Carolina town to assist the local law enforcement -- over the past few years, several young men have gone missing. The previous sheriff wrote them off as runaways but the current sheriff believes that they might have a serial killer on their hands and with nowhere else to turn, she has reluctantly turned to Harper Connelly and her strange ability to find bodies. And Harper finds them alright... she locates the burial site where more boys than just the ones missing from this town were buried after being raped, tortured, and killed. The sickening facts surrounding the fates of those boys puts the whole town in mourning, but now the sheriff has to find the person responsible... and realize that this might not be the work of one man.The crime itself is just horrifying. I'm not a squeamish person, but even I read a little quickly through any discussion of the case. This isn't a true crime novel but it's really terrifying to realize this is a possibility in the world. Truly sick individuals are capable of such violence and depravity. I'm also getting a bit sick of the fact that all three books have dealt with dead teens/kids... and sure, adults get tossed in there, too, but they're often not the main focus of the crime and end up dead as a result of learning something dangerous. These are cases where kids are murdered and it's pretty rough, particularly here.The mystery surrounding the culprit is actually more interesting than the past two books, though not necessarily any more mysterious. For those who are Harris fans from the Sookie Stackhouse books, the romantic storyline will be more what you're used to... in the sense that there are some pretty descriptive sex scenes (the first ones of the series, really). At the end of Grave Secret, Harper realized that she was in love with her step-brother, Tolliver. Note the emphasis on "step" and therefore not related by blood, as this is fairly crucial to understanding that it's not incesty... though the fact that they were partially raised together and have treated each other like siblings for years makes Harper's love all a bit complicated/weird. Lots of people reading these books (along with lots of characters in the stories) would find the very idea of this too weird, but oddly I'm okay with it. I mean, come on, it makes sense... they've been through a lot together (and continue to go through a lot together), so it seems a natural progression that given the option, they would band together in all ways. Harper doesn't want to be co-dependent upon Tolliver (and while Harris goes to lengths to prove that this isn't a weird co-dependent relationship, the reader never quite buys it), but he's always there for her and accepts her for what she is. Of course, Harper is too frightened of losing Tolliver and so resolves to never mention anything... but that never really works, does it? So An Ice Cold Grave deals a lot with Harper's feelings with regard to her brother and quite frankly, it's a welcome distraction from the case.Despite my discomfort with the case, I thought Harris was more spot-on with her characters in this book than she was with the last, and so I enjoyed this more than Grave Surprise. I'm not sure if it's the subject matter surrounding the characters or what, but this book definitely indicates that this will be a very limited series and even if I didn't know that only four books are out, I would say that all signs here point to a series conclusion happening very soon.
    • 5/5
      This was a fantastic read!
    • 4/5
      I think this series gets better with each successive book. Harper and Tolliver struggle with obligations, prejudices and personal feelings as they attempt to finish their latest job. The mystery is particularly disturbing as the victims are all high school boys who were tortured and raped. The storyline was interesting but I would like to see more permanent secondary characters (Manfred is a favorite). I'm looking forward to Harris telling the story of Harper's missing sister. Harper and Tolliver will have to confront their past and deal with their family. Lot's of dysfunctional fodder there. From her blog it sounds like that is what Harris is contemplating for the next installment.