Endangered by C.J. Box

Here you have it--Joe Pickett is one of my favorite characters ever.  C.J. Box has written 15 books about this now famous game warden whose purview is the state of Wyoming. Joe is a no-nonsense kind of guy with a heart of gold for his wife Marybeth and his three daughters.  The fact that Joe's number one sidekick just happens to be a yellow labrador named Daisy jumps him up a few notches in my estimation.

In this latest episode of Joe's saga, his daughter April has been found beaten and lying in a ditch. Joe's best friend Nate has just been released from prison after a four month stint and Joe has just discovered 21 dead sage grouse ( a species of bird that is close to being on the endangered species list).

As usual, C.J. Box takes the reader on an exciting traipse through the woods of Wyoming in search of the perpetrators of the crimes.  You can almost smell the pine trees and feel your feet sinking in the mounds of snow as you are propelled forward to unravel the twists and turns of Pickett's latest adventure.

Joe puts his seemingly limitless energy into trying to find out who did this to April, who killed all the birds, who tried to kill Nate and what happened to Nate's girlfriend Liv. Although some of the reveals seemed predictable, C.J. Box does not let us see how all the dots are connected until very late in the story.

Lots of action-packed scenes and believable characters go a long way to making this another great read from a great author.

Ladybookbug!