Below Zero

In this book, an environmentalist goes on a rampage. His father, who is dying from liver cancer, and who is a Chicago mobster, wants to make right to his family before he dies. So, he picks up his son and a girl who reminds him of his daughter, who is deceased and they travel out west. In order to make things right to his son, who is an environmentalist, he has to eliminate carbon imprint issues, starting with murdering a elderly couple for owning an oversized RV camper. It gets worse from there. Joe Pickett gets involved because the foster child, April, who they thought lost years ago in an FBI attack on a survivalist camp seems to be traveling with them. The story makes sense to me, and the characters make sense also. Maybe some folks want like that an environmentalist will go on the rampage, but who knows what could happens with the right environment.

I am a big CJ Box fan and have read all of the Joe P books, save one. (The Highway Quartet was fantastic.) But Below Zero is uncharacteristically cartoonish, political beyond necessity given the plot, and frankly, irritating. Perhaps I’ve had too much of Joe, Nate, and his family, which became progressively irritating in the book. (The whole idea of unearthing April seemed like an excuse to show the sensitive side of Joe. Rather, it showed him as a guy who needs help—and probably should take a leave of absence from being a game warden.) Less charitably, I was hoping Joe got busted for obstructing justice. His so-called reasons for needing to get to April before law enforcement didn’t wash. Joe lost his common sense and sense of who he is in the law enforcement community.

And Nate just got bothersome. Perhaps I’ve had too much of this Marvel-comic -like character. (Hey, where does Nate target practice? It takes a lot a range time to be that good with that revolver. ) And am I the only reader who assumed that Nate was taking his liberties with Marybeth but Joe just couldn’t accept this (or needed Nate’s super-hero’s abilities to the degree that he decided to play along).

Anyway, it was a good ride, until Below Zero.

Rich North

The role of Sheridan (and Lucy) along with super-Mom Marybeth made this a slighly grown-up version of Nancy Drew.

By the end of the book I couldn’t care less of what happened to any of them.

If you read this book without having read those that went before it, you will be informed of the background enough to understand it but you won’t enjoy it nearly so much. As in many of the Pickett novels, there are two co-existing plots and both are riveting. The story begins with a telephone message: “Tell Sherry that April called.” But Joe, his oldest daughter “Sherry” (actually Sheridan), and the family are shaken to their cores. April was a child they took in and were planning to adopt when her bio mother returned and then both were killed in a horrific arson and murder six years prior – or were they? That book, Winterkill, earlier in the series, was also excellent. The other plot here concerns a man crossing the country on a mission to become (and to force others to become) “carbon neutral,” to offset perceived crimes against the earth and environment. He’s a murderer, and Joe becomes involved (of course). I enjoy this series, and Joe, a game warden, is a great hero – humble, honest to a fault, tough and persistent. Wyoming is also a main character in this series, this time with the iconic Devil’s Tower ever present during a tense chase through the puzzle of roads in the Black Hills. I’ve already put the next in the series on my Kindle.

I’ve read the eight prior J. Pickett books in the series and this ninth one wasn’t very good. Slow start (much of it not involving Wyoming whatsoever – just two guys going around murdering people) and I had to really grind through to gain some traction on sticking with it. Too far-fetched in several ways. Too much focus on the bad guys’ personal issues and, except for one event, there really is no game warden or wildlife/nature stuff going on to speak of. I don’t choose this genre of books to read about chasing down an almost homeless girl who is stuck with a couple bad dudes from Chicago. I hope the series turns around and gets better like most of the earlier books.

I have enjoyed this series so far but this book kind of went off the rails. As a piece of fiction, you have to suspend reality a bit when reading these books, but Below Zero really takes it too far. The father and son villains and the way they interact just makes no sense, especially with respect to the father who is a Chicago mobster, but when it comes to his son, he has no backbone whatsoever. A sign of a good book is that you become engrossed in the characters and their personalities. In this case the father/son duo were so unbelievable that I constantly found myself thinking that their dialogue and actions were simply ridiculous.

Likewise, bringing back the April Keeley character is simply too far-fetched. Also, yet another plot regarding environmental extremism. I think the author needs to move away from this topic for a while.

I think the author has brought so many complications, twists and turns into the Pickett family and there myriad of problems and issues, that it has become burdensome to good storytelling. I recognize that conflict is needed to keep things interesting, but all of these plots and issues reminds me of the Jenga game — pulling one more brick out will tumble the entire structure.

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