Doc saves a beautiful woman stranded in the Alaskan wilderness. But he soon finds more than he bargained for as a black box and a tall, dark and dead man lead Doc to Manhattan on a thrilling mission to solve a macabre puzzle.

Fire And Ice is not an outstanding Doc but it isn't a bad one either. The first two-thirds of the book take place in Alaska where Doc rescues a beautiful but very frightened young woman named Patience. Someone is chasing her and trying to kill her but she won't explain any of this to Doc. The action then moves back to NYC where the mystery is resolved. The mystery is pretty good and also quite plausible. There is not a lot of the slam bang action Doc stories are noted for but it was well enough devised to hold my interest anyway. And sometimes the non-stop confrontations and fights get to be annoying simply because of the sheer volume of them. An interesting character, a tough old coot called Yukon, enters the story early on and remains a vital part of the plot all the way through, in a way, substituting as one of Doc's aides in the absence of the others. Monk and Ham appear in the last third of the story and are involved in resolving the mystery. All in all, not a great Doc but still well worth checking out.