2/12/198? Ice forms

February 12, 198?.  On this date the plot of Ice begins.  Ice was the 36th book in Ed McBain's excellent 87th Precinct series, police procedurals set in a nameless city that resembled but wasn't quite New York.

As with most of his one-word titles (a subset that included Bread, Calypso, Ghosts, Heat, etc.) "Ice" has several meanings in the book.  There is the weather, a drug, jewelry, and a reference to a theatre custom.

The New Yorker called it " a real stunner."