"...one of mystery's most exciting new talents..."

C. J. Box, one of mystery's most exciting new talents, offers more thrills and chills amid the dangerous beauties of the Wyoming wilderness in Winterkill. Game warden Joe Pickett is used to working alone: He has a 1,500-square-mile district to patrol, and when things are going well he sees more wildlife than people, even during hunting season. Unfortunately, things aren't going so well this winter: Just days before Christmas, as a massive storm builds in the mountains, Joe comes upon a crime -- an elk slaughter committed by a local federal bureaucrat. Things get more complicated when the criminal escapes into the storm, only to be killed by an unknown assailant armed with a powerful hunting bow. Joe's search for the murderer is complicated by more deadly weather, plus jurisdictional disputes, political power plays, and family worries. The sheriff and a power-hungry federal investigator want to pin the crime on forces from a recently arrived antigovernment isolationist group. But as the investigation unfolds, Joe begins to suspect that the real killer is someone local, shielded by familiarity and the powerful storms that bury and erase vital evidence. Unfortunately, more than truth and justice hang in the balance -- it's also a personal matter for Joe, whose beloved foster daughter has been returned to the custody of her birth mother, who is one of the isolationists. - Sue Stone