The Wolf Pack, C. J. Box

C. J. Box really does a good job of giving the rural Wyoming setting of his Joe Pickett novels weight and impact. The wide-open spaces, remote areas, reliance of the locals on their hunting, the small-town ambience all contribute to the atmosphere and the lives of the characters. He also does well to weave the vagaries and frequent downright asininity of state politics into the narrative just enough to keep it from being cartoonish and clumsy.

Every so often, though, Box will get the urge to trek into the back story and world of game warden Joe's friend Nate Romanowski. Nate's shadowy history as a government operative and his deep devotion to falconry and the life of the wild raptor birds have made him a good fit for the remote and off-the-grid potential of Joe's neck of the woods. But when he takes on a larger role and drives the narrative himself, Nate pushes the series into the somewhat sillier realm of the modern-day espionage thriller. Box writes just as well and he makes his plot move just as smoothly but one key strength of the Joe Pickett series has been its groundedness and realism. The intrusion of Super Secret Soldiers dilutes that and the fallout of some previous secret squirrel activity drives too much of the story in 2019's Wolf Pack.

Ordinarily, teaming the Nate storyline of him being hunted by a Sinaloa cartel kill squad with a couple other more grounded ones would help settle down the excesses of the more outlandish story. But in Wolf Pack, the ancillary plots lack focus and definition. Joe's investigation into what amounts to drone bullying of wildlife herds runs into the twin obstacles of federal interference and the fact that his daughter Lucy dates the drone jerk's son. The overlap between these two plotlines is minimal and artificial, almost as if either of them could have been a novellete on its own but for some reason someone felt they needed stitched together to be between the same cover.

Again, Box's writing and dialogue remain first rate, but in Wolf Pack that only serves to highlight just how sub-par the story is to begin with.