Dark Sky

I dont review many books because others can do a better job than I. I read a lot of books, over 200 a year an it is rare that a story pulls me in to the point that I cant put it down. I finished this one at 4 am.

After reading it I was sure that there would be a review by someone saying that they wouldnt read it because the the Republican Governor was portrayed as a schemer and not so nice guy. And yes there was already one such review. The reviewer has missed a really good book by being offended by the description of one character.

There are many issues that are relevant in our society that are woven deftly in to this story. The good and bad of social media, hunting, gun rights, bullying, suicide, revenge, and people who commit evil acts as well as those who do the right thing regardless. It actually made me think about the amount of time I spend on social media. It is far too easy for people to bully and harass others safely behind a computer screen. And social media has contributed to the polarization of our society in many ways.

Dont let a few pages stop you from reading a really good book. To me, a really good book not only entertains it makes one think. This book does that from all sides.

C.J. Box, I firmly believe, is not capable of writing a bad novel. But in the last few years I’ve begun to suspect that he’s all too capable of writing an uninspired above-average novel, and DARK SKY, while above average in almost all respects compared to other entires in the Joe Pickett series and to other authors in his genre treading similar trails, does nothing to dispel this slowly dawning suspicion.

DARK SKY is a novel that feels … tired. And not just because Box seems to have gone once too often one of his favorite plot tropes: pairing Joe Pickett with a doofus or a dilettante in the Wyoming mountain wilderness, isolated, under-equipped and on the run from killers. This time, Joe is the unwitting, unwilling companion of Steve “Steve-2” Price, a Silicon Valley social-media mogul who comes across as something of a cross between Mark Zuckerberg and Elon Musk. Joe is assigned to be Price’s wilderness guide when hunting and cutting his own meat because Steve-2’s latest obsession with authenticity. Little do they know that Price is being targeted by a trio of men bent on revenge because a family member of theirs was shamed into suicide by Price’s Facebook-like social-media app, ConFab.

Price isn’t uninteresting, and neither are the killers, or some other characters who turn out to hidden agendas where Steve-2 is concerned. But if you’ve read all the Pickett books this is his twenty-first outing you’ve read this story a few times before. And beyond that, Joe doesn’t really have any interesting thoughts or observations about the world Steve-2 represents, and because Steve-2 is quite a loquacious fellow, Joe all but disappears under the weight of his guest star. There’s some hammy sermonizing, pro and con, about the goods and the evils of social media, but nothing that passes for piercing insight beyond the drunk-at-the-end-of-the-bar level. Even Joe’s signature line “Things are about to get real Western here” feels like it’s being delivered as an obligation, like a band that has to play its biggest hit before its fans will allow it to leave the stage.

It makes me wonder if Joe is all done growing as a character, because he doesn’t grow an inch in DARK SKY.

Really, none of Box’s stock company registers to much effect here. Nate Romanowski does his Nate thing, tearing off ears and being tortured by his dark past, yadda yadda. Marybeth Pickett provides alarm and assistance in equal measure. We briefly meet Twelve Sleep County’s new prosecuting attorney and sheriff. Daughters Lucy and April are AWOL. Same with Joe’s evil mother-in-law, usually the most interesting character in a Pickett novel.

Far from AWOL is Sheridan Pickett. Joe’s eldest daughter seems to be a full-fledged adult here, living on her own, finding her own code, happily apprenticed to Nate as a falconer in training. In fact, she’s grown so much that she seems to be straining at the boundaries Box has put on her, still treated to some degree like the little girl who still needs protecting by men from men, and one gets the feeling that she’s outgrown that role and then some. Her father seems to be grappling with that a bit himself during a moment of mortal, climactic danger: “The rider was Sheridan, her hat flying off her head and her hair streaming behind her as she rode. To Joe, she looked like a younger, faster, female version of John Wayne as Rooster Cogburn in TRUE GRIT.”

The ending of DARK SKY has me wondering if maybe, just maybe, Joe Pickett’s ready to hang up his game warden’s badge. And if Box is ready to hang up Joe Pickett as a lead character, and maybe, just maybe, hand over the reins to Sheridan Pickett. If so, I hope so. Her voice, her youth, her gender in manly-man, Republican country, no less feels ready to step in and take over, and for many reasons, the time feels right. If nothing else, Joe Pickett has earned his emeritus-hero status.

I stopped on page 20 after several pages of reading about evil —boooo—scary—Republican administration in Wyoming. I wanted to read Box’s newest book. I love his characters, the wide open country of his settings, and always a good mystery. Did not want him to jump on the political bandwagon like so many of my favorite authors have done lately. If I go back and finish the book, I’ll write another review. I really had been looking forward to this book.

Game warden Joe Pickett has only recently gotten a cell phone and learned to text. At fifty-one, hes never been on social media. And now the governor wants him to take a billionaire social media tycoon on an elk hunt. The hidden agenda is to give Steven Price such a thrilling experience that hell put his huge new server project in Wyoming. If Joe fails to deliver the great adventure, Joe will be fired and his department will be defunded.

Adventure is forthcoming but not the right kind. The weather is bitter cold. And while Price hunts elk, a family of murderous locals hunts him. As Joe attempts to get himself and Price off the mountain without food or weapons betrayals abound, bullets fly, knives flash, and bodies pile up. I was riveted. I devoured Dark Sky in one day and night.

Joes falconer friend, Nate Romanowski, also plays a role in the plot, so the reader can expect some satisfying violence on the side of good. (Can I say that?) Anyway, Joe Picketts latest impossible mission is a thrilling tale of wilderness survival. Conversations between Joe and his arrogant and rather naive charge are always interesting and often amusing.

C. J. Box has delivered another superlative Joe Pickett novel. The laconic, trouble-prone, oddly resourceful game warden is aging but never grows old.

What a page turner but its what I always expect from Mr. Box. I was born and raised in Wyoming and it never ceases to amaze me how spot on the details are making it obvious that only a Wyoming native could portray those details so well.

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