Mike Bowditch series, #10
Publisher’s Synopsis
In this thrilling entry in Edgar Award finalist Paul Doiron’s bestselling series, a deadly attack on one of Maine’s last wild wolves leads Game Warden Mike Bowditch to an even bigger criminal conspiracy.
While on vacation, Warden Investigator Mike Bowditch receives a strange summons from Billy Cronk, one of his oldest friends and a man he had to reluctantly put behind bars for murder. Billy wants him to investigate a new female prison guard with a mysterious past, and Mike feels honor-bound to help his friend. But when the guard becomes the victim in a brutal attack at the prison, he realizes there may be a darker cover-up at play—and that Billy and his family might be at risk.
Then Mike receives a second call for help, this time from a distant mountain valley where Shadow, a wolf-hybrid he once cared for, has been found shot by an arrow and clinging to life. He searches for the identity of the bowman, but his investigation is blocked at every turn by the increasingly hostile community. And when Billy’s wife and children are threatened, Mike finds himself tested like never before. How can he possibly keep the family safe when he has enemies of his own on his trail?
Torn between loyalties, Mike Bowditch must respond in the only way he knows how: by bending every law and breaking every rule to keep his loved ones safe and the true predators at bay.
Author: Paul Doiron
Publisher: Minotaur Books, St. Martin’s Press (Available July 2, 2019)
Genre: Mysteries
Series: Mike Bowditch Series, #10
- Hardcover: 320 pages
My Thoughts:
My first thought when I started reading this story about Mike Bowditch, was that it reminded me so much of the books written by C.J. Box. (I introduced my dad to these books about three years ago, and it wasn’t any time before he’d read them all. Needless to say, he loved them. Though he passed away in November of last year, I’m positive he would have loved books by Paul Doiron just as much.)
I think that you’ll find that this story has beautiful descriptions of Maine as well as interesting mysteries. To be honest, I’m not a major fan of too much description, since I’m always so excited to move ahead with the storyline. But in this case, Doiron has done a wonderful job of balancing movement and description.
I found that the characters managed to easily slip into place as those I would like to read more about. In fact, oh silly me, I liked them so much that after finishing the book I checked to see if Doiron planned to make this book into a series. Hello! Now that’s a good writer to be able to hide the fact that this is the10th book in a series. Yes, there were references to past events, but I wasn’t slowed down in the least by lengthy descriptions of happenings. (Or alerted to the fact that these references were to previous books! I must have been totally engrossed with the story.)
So that should answer the question, Is this a stand-alone book? Absolutely!
What Concerned Me:
I’m only noting this. It isn’t really a concern.
The book is a mystery, in my way of thinking, not a thriller.
What I Liked Best:
For this type of book, not a fast page-turning thriller, but rather a story that includes relationships, unique individuals, a mystery, and a story that continues on with interesting characters, I couldn’t ask for more.
As you might guess, the characters jump to the front of my list, followed by the interesting mysteries.
About The Author
Paul Doiron is the author of the Mike Bowditch series of crime novels, including The Poacher’s Son, which won the the Barry Award and the Strand Critics Award for Best First Novel and was nominated for an Edgar Award, an Anthony Award, a Macavity Award, and a Thriller Award for Best First Novel, and the Maine Literary Award for “Best Fiction of 2010.” PopMatters named it to its Best Fiction of 2010 list.
His second book, Trespasser, won the Maine Literary Award, was an American Booksellers Association Indie Bestseller, and has been called a “masterpiece of high-octane narrative” by Booklist. The third novel, Bad Little Falls, was a Bookscan Bestseller and a nominee for the RT Reviewers Choice Award and the Maine Literary Award. Massacre Pond, the fourth in the series, was an Indie Next pick and an Indie Favorite, as well as Bookscan Bestseller, and Maine Literary Award finalist. The Bone Orchard received a Best of Maine award from Down East. The Precipice was a LibraryReads selection and a RT Top Pick. The seventh Mike Bowditch novel, Widowmaker, was also a LibraryReads selection and a #1 Maine Sunday Telegram bestseller. Published in 2017, Knife Creek was Paul’s bestselling novel to date. The ninth book in the series, Stay Hidden, was a USA Today Bestseller and the best-selling novel in the series to date.
In 2019 Paul received his second Edgar Award nomination for “Rabid,” an eShort that reveals some of the secret history of his breakout character Charley Stevens (also available as digital audio).
Paul is Editor Emeritus of Down East: The Magazine of Maine, having served as Editor in Chief from 2005 to 2013, before stepping down to write full time. A native of Maine, he attended Yale University, where he graduated with a degree in English, and he holds an MFA in creative writing from Emerson College. He is a former member of the Maine Arts Commission and current chair of the Maine Humanities Council. He is also a Registered Maine Guide specializing in fly fishing and lives on a trout stream in coastal Maine with his wife Kristen Lindquist.
His novels have been translated into 11 languages: German, Japanese, Spanish, Portuguese, Russian, Polish, Romanian, Slovenian, Hungarian, Czech, and Finnish. The UK editions of his books are published by Constable & Robinson, a division of Little Brown. (from the author’s website)
YouTube regarding the previous book, #9
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