STORM WATCH

5 stars out of 5

Pick a hot-button topic: Cybercurrency mining. Survivalists hoping to overthrow the government. Conspiracy theories. Politicians with questionable campaign donors. Chinese interference. You'll find 'em all in here. And caught smack dab in the middle are Wyoming game warden Joe Pickett and his falcon-loving, former fugitive-from-justice friend Nate Romanowski.

The whole thing begins as Joe is looking for a wounded elk that needs to be put out of her misery and seems to be wandering around on a friend's remote property. Mission accomplished, but in the process Joe comes across something a bit more worrisome: a dead body half in, half out of a building from which strange sounds are emanating. The friend is evasive, and the subsequent identification of the body brings more questions than answers.

Meantime, as Nate is dealing with burgeoning demand for his bird abatement business, he's approached by a shady guy who wants him to join a group of men who, like Nate, don't trust the government - but who want to kick their distrust up more than a few notches. Given his background, Nate is willing to listen - but will he jump in knowing the guns may come out?

In the midst of this is the weather - snow deep enough to bring a several-ton plow to its knees - and a state governor who's power hungry, itching to get reelected and decidedly not a fan of Joe, who was aligned with the previous governor who just might decide to run again. All told, once the action gears up it's full speed ahead right up to an ending that probably has more potential to go wrong than right - and the whole thing held my attention throughout. Many thanks to the publisher, via NetGalley, for allowing me to read and review another of the books in one of my favorite series. Well done!

Storm Watch by C.J. Box (G.P. Putnam's Sons, February 2023); 368 pp.