Open Season

 

Open Season by C.J. Box

Joe Pickett #1

Mystery

2001

Finished on January 11, 2025

Rating: 4/5 (Very Good)

Publisher's Blurb:

Joe Pickett is the new game warden in Twelve Sleep, Wyoming, a town where nearly everyone hunts and the game warden—especially one like Joe who won't take bribes or look the other way—is far from popular. When he finds a local hunting outfitter dead, splayed out on the woodpile behind his state-owned home, he takes it personally. There had to be a reason that the outfitter, with whom he's had run-ins before, chose his backyard, his woodpile to die in. Even after the "outfitter murders," as they have been dubbed by the local press after the discovery of the two more bodies, are solved, Joe continues to investigate, uneasy with the easy explanation offered by the local police.

As Joe digs deeper into the murders, he soon discovers that the outfitter brought more than death to his backyard: he brought Joe an endangered species, thought to be extinct, which is now living in his woodpile. But if word of the existence of this endangered species gets out, it will destroy any chance of InterWest, a multi-national natural gas company, building an oil pipeline that would bring the company billions of dollars across Wyoming, through the mountains and forests of Twelve Sleep. The closer Joe comes to the truth behind the outfitter murders, the endangered species and InterWest, the closer he comes to losing everything he holds dear.

A solid entry in C.J. Box's popular mystery series! I was drawn in quickly, and found myself marveling at the fact that this was the author's debut work; the writing is polished and the plotting skillfully delivered. I guessed the bad guys' identities early on, but that didn't spoil my enjoyment. I've only read Open Season, but Joe Pickett brings to mind Craig Johnson's character, Walt Longmire. 

I bought Open Season while my husband and I were exploring Yellowstone and the Grand Tetons last fall (hoping to buy something by a local author) and I liked the book so well, I plan to read as much of the series as I can throughout the year. Box's detailed descriptions of the land and of the wildlife that inhabit Wyoming were fun to read now that I've been to that area of the country. There is some subject matter that is difficult to read (a young child and her mother find themselves in a dangerous situation with one of the villains), but none of those scenarios felt gratuitous. I did take issue, however, with two of the male characters and their commentary on women and their bodies. All in all, a quick read and a good story! Recommend.