C.J. Box's latest: This time it's personal for Joe Pickett
In C. J. Box's first five novels, Wyoming game warden Joe Pickett has investigated ecoterrorists, greedy land developers and meat fanatics. But he has paid a price for his investigations — he and his wife find themselves increasingly at odds with each other, his teenage daughter doesn't understand why he isn't like "normal" dads, and his reputation as a "maverick" is causing his role within the Game and Fish Department to deteriorate.

But the themes that dominate "In Plain Sight," Box's newest novel, are more personal. Hate. Family. Revenge.

Opal Scarlett, the matriarch of a Twelve Sleep County family whose philanthropy and eccentricities have run the county since 1883, has disappeared, setting off a battle between her two older sons, Arlen and Hank, for control of Thunderhead Ranch, the family's thousand-square-mile spread. The fight quickly divides the town as everyone supports one son or the other.

Because Hank is more volatile and unstable, his daughter, Julie, lives in the main ranch house with Arlen, further exacerbating the brothers' animosity toward each other. And Julie is best friends with Sheridan, Joe's older daughter, which by the end of the book will put them both in harm's way.

But even more threatening is John Wayne Keeley, recently released from a Tennessee prison. Keeley's brother, sister-in-law and niece were killed during a confrontation between the FBI and military separatists (as detailed in "Winter Kill," Box's third novel), and Keeley holds Joe responsible. Traveling cross-country, leaving dead bodies in his wake, Keeley intends to exact his revenge, and uses the battle between Arlen and Hank to cover his own dangerous plans.

More thriller than mystery, "In Plain Sight" balances the two plots effectively, and they come together in a tense climax that occurs during heavy thunderstorms and a flash flood. The only problem is that setting up the climax requires events that are difficult to believe and characters behaving uncharacteristically. Box skillfully weaves in events from earlier books: New readers can understand what's happening, while existing fans won't be bored by a recap of things they already know. And as always, his descriptions of the rugged Wyoming landscape are so good readers will feel like they are there.

The series has allowed Box to develop the important supporting characters, notably Joe's wife, Marybeth, and daughter Sheridan. Joe and Marybeth have experienced tension in their marriage, and while they've stayed together through good times and bad, there is ongoing unresolved conflict. Sheridan has become a teenager, full of the questions, certainty and wisdom that only comes with adolescence. These family issues are not fully resolved, and will no doubt form the basis of future books.

But as usual, it is Joe who carries the book. As one character tells another about Joe, "Once you start with him, you better be prepared to hang on." The same can be said about C. J. Box, and we mystery readers are the better for it. By Chuck Brownman, For the Camera
May 14, 2006