After a long period of exile, Joe Pickett is a week away from returning home when he stubbornly puts himself in harm’s way. He encounters a couple of very adroit twins on a mountain and gets himself shot full of arrows and almost killed, all over a fishing license. (Joe, of course, is nominally a fish and wildlife warden.)
This is an unusual story, pitting the forces of the government and powerful, rich people against ordinary persons, setting up Joe and his mysterious buddy Nate to have to make decisions more like a Hobson’s choice. It is an extremely powerful tale raising all kinds of moral issues.
As in past novels in the series, descriptions of the wildlife and Wyoming mountains and lakes are both natural and beautiful. The characters are richly drawn and the dialogue taut, and the book is recommended.
