Status
Available
Series
Genres
Collection
Publication
G.P. Putnam's Sons (2002), 304 pages
Description
Fiction. Mystery. Suspense. Thriller. HTML:Don't miss the Spectrum Originals series JOE PICKETT! The first novel in the thrilling series featuring Wyoming game warden Joe Pickett from #1 New York Times bestselling author C. J. Box. Joe Pickett is the new game warden in Twelve Sleep, Wyoming, a town where nearly everyone hunts and the game warden�??especially one like Joe who won't take bribes or look the other way�??is far from popular. When he finds a local hunting outfitter dead, splayed out on the woodpile behind his state-owned home, he takes it personally. There had to be a reason that the outfitter, with whom he's had run-ins before, chose his backyard, his woodpile to die in. Even after the "outfitter murders," as they have been dubbed by the local press after the discovery of the two more bodies, are solved, Joe continues to investigate, uneasy with the easy explanation offered by the local police. As Joe digs deeper into the murders, he soon discovers that the outfitter brought more than death to his backdoor: he brought Joe an endangered species, thought to be extinct, which is now living in his woodpile. But if word of the existence of this endangered species gets out, it will destroy any chance of InterWest, a multi-national natural gas company, building an oil pipeline that would bring the company billions of dollars across Wyoming, through the mountains and forests of Twelve Sleep. The closer Joe comes to the truth behind the outfitter murders, the endangered species and InterWest, the closer he comes to losing everything he holds… (more)
User reviews
LibraryThing member PattyLee
Not my usual fare. Very masculine, lots of guns, wild critters, wilderness- in spite of how sensitive the main character is. Also page turning ending replete with a rather gory denouement.
LibraryThing member streamsong
This is the first of the twenty plus installments of the Joe Pickett mysteries.
Joe is a Wyoming game warden. He has just been given his first district to oversee. His pregnant wife and two young daughters have joined him in tiny, outdated isolated government housing. He’d love to be able to give
Besides the usual wildlife concerns, a natural gas pipeline company is spending a huge amount of money to push a pipeline through the district.
Then one night, his oldest daughter sees a monster come down from the mountain. There are strange rumors about the impossible in the high country. Bodies began to pile up.
What will a good and moral man do to protect his district and, more especially, his family?
I love the mountains and the wildlife in this book. I also like the protagonist's character. It's reassuring to me in this time of moral ambiguity to have a 'straight shooting' protagonist.
I found some scenes quite intense, almost uncomfortably so. Threatening small children can make a tough read.
I live in an area where hunting is a fact of life, and although there can be abuses, I believe it is necessary. However, those with anti-hunting sentiments will probably not enjoy this series. Athough a game warden is responsible for all the wildlife in the district, hunting is of course, a primary concern.
Joe is a Wyoming game warden. He has just been given his first district to oversee. His pregnant wife and two young daughters have joined him in tiny, outdated isolated government housing. He’d love to be able to give
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them more. His wife (and her mother) especially chafe under the low wages and tight housing.Besides the usual wildlife concerns, a natural gas pipeline company is spending a huge amount of money to push a pipeline through the district.
Then one night, his oldest daughter sees a monster come down from the mountain. There are strange rumors about the impossible in the high country. Bodies began to pile up.
What will a good and moral man do to protect his district and, more especially, his family?
I love the mountains and the wildlife in this book. I also like the protagonist's character. It's reassuring to me in this time of moral ambiguity to have a 'straight shooting' protagonist.
I found some scenes quite intense, almost uncomfortably so. Threatening small children can make a tough read.
I live in an area where hunting is a fact of life, and although there can be abuses, I believe it is necessary. However, those with anti-hunting sentiments will probably not enjoy this series. Athough a game warden is responsible for all the wildlife in the district, hunting is of course, a primary concern.
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LibraryThing member chinquapin
This was a page-turning, sit on the edge of your seat, exciting mystery set in the wilderness of Wyoming. The main character, Joe Picket, is a Wyoming game warden, working in an environment that is just seething with corruption and greed. Basically, an oil company wants to build a pipeline through
The plot and excitement were superb, and I thoroughly enjoyed the unusual Joe Pickett, definitely an anti-hero kind of guy, especially for a Wyoming game warden. So, I will be picking up the next one in this series.
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the Twelve Sleep Valley area and will do anything to make this happen. A well-known poacher ends up dead on his woodpile after a breakneck speed horse ride down from the mountains, bleeding from gunshot wounds. Pickett tries to unravel the mystery, but people all around him want the investigation done and over. The plot and excitement were superb, and I thoroughly enjoyed the unusual Joe Pickett, definitely an anti-hero kind of guy, especially for a Wyoming game warden. So, I will be picking up the next one in this series.
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LibraryThing member debs4jc
I've heard great things about C.J. Box's books, and I wasn't disappointed upon trying this first of his mystery series featuring Joe Pickett. Pickett is a Wyoming Game Warden who becomes suspicious after a man he had had some dealing with in the past turns up dead at his back door. His superiors
The mystery element is well done, and the environmental angle added a lot of depth to the story. Pickett's family life was also well portrayed, although I felt sorry for the way they were put in danger. Those that like mysteries and especially those that are interested in environmental issues or enjoy stories set in the great outdoors will enjoy this one.
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warn him off investigating, but Pickett is convinced there is more to this death than he is being told. He begins to make discoveries that could mean an endangered animal is being threatened--but that doesn't compare to the threat to his own family that develops.The mystery element is well done, and the environmental angle added a lot of depth to the story. Pickett's family life was also well portrayed, although I felt sorry for the way they were put in danger. Those that like mysteries and especially those that are interested in environmental issues or enjoy stories set in the great outdoors will enjoy this one.
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LibraryThing member BrianEWilliams
I wanted to read this book because I had read another one in the series ("Free Fire") and thought that it was great. This book is the first of the series and introduces readers to Joe Pickett, a game warden in Wyoming. "Free Fire" is a better book ("I read a review to the effect that it was the
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best of the series), the writing is smoother and the plot was slightly better developed, but "Open Season" is still a good book. I look forward to reading others in the series to fill in the story gaps between "Open Season" and "Free Fire". Also, there's a new one coming out later in 2009 which I look forward to reading. Show Less
LibraryThing member amf0001
I just couldn't get into this book about Joe Pickett, because he was such a.. a shmuck. He was meant to be an everyman, but he missed glaring things and didn't make connections, and basically seemed like a boy who liked camping and was totally out of his depth with no idea of how to swim back. I
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liked the depictions of Wyoming life and it felt authentic but I wanted a hero with a bit more nous about him. I saw the entire plot almost from the outset, so there was no tension, just a sort of impatience while I watied for Joe to catch up and the story telling was not compelling enough to make up for it. Maybe he gets better later on... I may give the series one more shot... Show Less
LibraryThing member LaurieRKing
A clear and interesting voice for crime.
LibraryThing member maneekuhi
I've read many crime fiction series, and the crime solvers have been police detectives, PI's, reporters, coroners,psychologists, cleaners, but never a .......game warden??? Well, it certainly worked for this first of (so far) eight Joe Pickett novels. I'm not 100% sold that I can continue to buy
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into a game warden protaganist for an ongoing series but the writing by C J Box is so good that I will certainly try at least the next two novels. I also like stories based in today's US west, in this case Wyoming, and while I'm no expert, the descriptions, language, behaviors feel right. Lots of tension after the initial first third of the book build up, and that first act was good enough to keep me interested. Joe is married, with kids, and the kids are done very well, and are integral to Open Season. Box has done as good a job as Michael Robotham, perhaps slightly better, in weaving the hero's family as victims into the story and through them elevating the emotional twists of the novel. Show Less
LibraryThing member wyvernfriend
Joe Pickett is a wyoming game warden who finds himself in the middle of a murder mystery that also involves endangered animals, hunting season and eithics. The first body turns up on his door which involves him and it looks like the law isn't interested in the case, but when Joe's family are
I enjoyed the read and look forward to more in this series.
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endangered it turns very interesting. It's an interesting read and you can see where Joe tries to balance sense with the rules and how people with power can abuse it. I enjoyed the read and look forward to more in this series.
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LibraryThing member mysterymax
So far, C.J. Box has never disappointed.
LibraryThing member she_climber
The first book in a series that my Dad has been reading (I'd read the stand-alone Blue Heaven and liked it) and I am hooked!! I love the characters, I love the concept of the the Pickett family, and Joe being a Game Warden, for a variation on the norm, and there were so many twists and turns in the
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book I couldn't decide who did it, but the bodies kept dropping. I can't wait to start the next one. Show Less
LibraryThing member edwardsgt
Newly installed in Saddlestring Wyoming, Wildlife Ranger Joe Pickett finds himself out of his depth when a dead body turns up in his yard and he unwittingly uncovers a trail of corruption which threatens his family. Interesting variation on a theme with Joe an unlikely hero and torn between local
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loyalties, doing his job and broader wildlife conservation issues. A good first novel. Show Less
LibraryThing member macygma
Back in 2001, CJ Box wrote the first novel featuring Joe Pickett. This is it. A great story that keeps you up wondering who/what and, most importantly - why? People are willing to kill over land - always have been - but this is particularly brutal. Land leases, government projects with big money
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pay days, little forest critters. These all combine in a tale of good guys gone bad. Show Less
LibraryThing member Larou
It is possible I might have enjoyed this book more if I had not read it such a short time after James Lee Burke’s The Glass Rainbow; but with Burke - his vivid. intense prose style, the vividness of his characters and the moral bleakness of the world they navigate - fresh in mind, C.J. Box’
It does have an interesting premise, though - set in a rural area of the United States (and thus, although it is Wyoming rather than Louisiana, again inviting comparison to Burke), it features what certainly must be one of the more interesting protagonists in US crime fiction. Not just because of his profession (he is a game warden) but because Joe Pickett is such a thoroughly average guy – he is married with two kids, would much prefer being left in peace to having to hunt criminals, is frustrated because his job is paying barely enough to make a decent living, generally worries a lot - and not without reason, as he has a proven knack for messing things up spectacularly.
Joe Pickett is a very likeable protagonist (maybe even a bit too much so to feel entirely true) and his very averageness makes him stand out among fictional detectives. But while its hero is Open Season‘s biggest asset, he is also in a way its greatest problem. It is almost as if his character was bleeding through and affecting every other aspect of the novel – the language is bland, his nature descriptions (again, a huge contrast to Burke) unimaginative, his secondary characters cardboard, and the mystery stops being mysterious at about a quarter into the novel. In short, Open Season, while not exactly horrible, ends up being a decidedly mediocre novel, and for the most part I found it rather a slog to get through. Tension does mount a bit in the finale, but that was too few too late, and did not make much of a dent into the overall impression of boredom.
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first novel fell decided short for me.It does have an interesting premise, though - set in a rural area of the United States (and thus, although it is Wyoming rather than Louisiana, again inviting comparison to Burke), it features what certainly must be one of the more interesting protagonists in US crime fiction. Not just because of his profession (he is a game warden) but because Joe Pickett is such a thoroughly average guy – he is married with two kids, would much prefer being left in peace to having to hunt criminals, is frustrated because his job is paying barely enough to make a decent living, generally worries a lot - and not without reason, as he has a proven knack for messing things up spectacularly.
Joe Pickett is a very likeable protagonist (maybe even a bit too much so to feel entirely true) and his very averageness makes him stand out among fictional detectives. But while its hero is Open Season‘s biggest asset, he is also in a way its greatest problem. It is almost as if his character was bleeding through and affecting every other aspect of the novel – the language is bland, his nature descriptions (again, a huge contrast to Burke) unimaginative, his secondary characters cardboard, and the mystery stops being mysterious at about a quarter into the novel. In short, Open Season, while not exactly horrible, ends up being a decidedly mediocre novel, and for the most part I found it rather a slog to get through. Tension does mount a bit in the finale, but that was too few too late, and did not make much of a dent into the overall impression of boredom.
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LibraryThing member SteveAldous
An enjoyable read, which is a little slow to get going in the opening chapters as it establishes the strong and realistic characters of Joe Pickett and his family. Unfortunately most of the other characters resemble the standard genre types. The mystery elements don't really work as there are too
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few characters and little in the way of red herrings. Where the book does work is in taking the reader through Joe's experiences as he gets sucked deeper into the case and begins to unravel the motives behind the events he has witnessed. The pace picks up in the last third as Joe closes in on the truth and there is a satisfying finale. Show Less
LibraryThing member bookswoman
This is the first book in another series that I've heard about for years but haven't gotten around to reading until now - sure glad that that people on DorothyL keep talking about these great series so that eventually I work my way toward them.
Joe Pickett is a Warden for the Game, Fish and Parks in
Things start getting strange when an outfitter rides his horse into Joe's yard and dies. He was shot twice in the chest and was carrying a gun and a cooler. Joe helps find out what everyone thinks happened but he isn't sure that they have the right answers. What he finds out in the end endangers his life and the lives of his family.
Well written, great characters and a good story. I saw a review that said that the oldest daughter was one of the best depictions of a little girl written and I agree, she is smart but still a kid which is how it should be.
I'll be reading more in this series.
Joe Pickett is a Warden for the Game, Fish and Parks in
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Wyoming. He is relatively new at the job and does make a few mistakes (makes him normal in my view). He has a wife, two daughters and a child on the way.Things start getting strange when an outfitter rides his horse into Joe's yard and dies. He was shot twice in the chest and was carrying a gun and a cooler. Joe helps find out what everyone thinks happened but he isn't sure that they have the right answers. What he finds out in the end endangers his life and the lives of his family.
Well written, great characters and a good story. I saw a review that said that the oldest daughter was one of the best depictions of a little girl written and I agree, she is smart but still a kid which is how it should be.
I'll be reading more in this series.
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LibraryThing member CherieDooryard
I've been trying to expand my appreciation for mysteries, and CJ Box was recommended by a friend. This was very good, even if it had that awkward intro feeling that first books often have. Joe Pickett is a great everyman character with good potential for growth. This is pretty suspenseful, more so
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than I find Robert Parker books, but not awful--even for an anxious person like me. Show Less
LibraryThing member gbelik
This is the first book in a series. Joe Picket is a Wyoming Game Warden who seems singularly un-macho. He seems to be on the fringes of the law enforcement community in the area. He started his career there by ticketing the governor for fishing without a license and he is having trouble living that
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down. A body turns up in his own woodpile and his own child becomes involved so he takes this problem on with gusto. A great series beginning. Show Less
LibraryThing member EllsbethB
This was an engaging read. There were times I found myself angry at the author for the choices he made with his characters, but the way the ending worked out, those choices made sense. Box does a good job depicting Wyoming and I look forward to reading more of his novels.
LibraryThing member labdaddy4
I wanted to read the authors books in the order they were written. This is his first and the first with the primary character being Joe Pickett. A good read - the pace picked up as the book progresses. The book had a very interesting blend of environmentalism and crime drama. I llok forward to
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reading more by this author. Show Less
LibraryThing member BookConcierge
3.5 stars
Joe Pickett's debut - a Wyoming State Game Warden, and all-around good guy. A little "slow" on the uptake - or so everyone thinks. They think wrong. Good plotting and likable character I want to get to know better. I'll keep reading this series.
Joe Pickett's debut - a Wyoming State Game Warden, and all-around good guy. A little "slow" on the uptake - or so everyone thinks. They think wrong. Good plotting and likable character I want to get to know better. I'll keep reading this series.
LibraryThing member TooBusyReading
Having read a later book in this series, I thought I'd go back to the beginning and read this first book. While I am sure it will have fans, it just didn't work for me. I should have known that a series about a game warden wouldn't appeal. There are little creatures that appear in a woodpile. Cool,
I hated that the game warden's children lost their puppy and kitty to coyotes. You'd think a game warden wouldn't give his kid pets only to let them die. There was a good deal of environmental positing, and not always a view I support. Too much hunting, too much violence, not a strong enough story line. One rather grisly image of a kitty, and violence directed at children.
I can understand why many will like this series, but having given two books in it a chance, I'm done.
I listened to an Audible unabridged version of this book.
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but there are too many holes in the story of these little ones. It felt rather jumbled.I hated that the game warden's children lost their puppy and kitty to coyotes. You'd think a game warden wouldn't give his kid pets only to let them die. There was a good deal of environmental positing, and not always a view I support. Too much hunting, too much violence, not a strong enough story line. One rather grisly image of a kitty, and violence directed at children.
I can understand why many will like this series, but having given two books in it a chance, I'm done.
I listened to an Audible unabridged version of this book.
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LibraryThing member PeterWhitfield
A good thriller but the context is very American and written for a male audience- everyone has guns and there are nutters in the backwoods, not just the survivalists!
World 2/5 US & guns
Writing 3/5 good but not literature
Plot 3/5 a bit slow to start and then things get more interesting
Characters 4/5
World 2/5 US & guns
Writing 3/5 good but not literature
Plot 3/5 a bit slow to start and then things get more interesting
Characters 4/5
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good goodies v bad nasties! Show Less
LibraryThing member DeltaQueen50
Open Season is the first book in the C.J. Box’s series about Wyoming Game Warden Joe Pickett. Set in the fictional country of Twelve Sleep, Joe is the newly appointed Game Warden, replacing his mentor Vern Dunnegan in the position. Joe is a straight up family man, loving his wife, his two
Unfortunately he finds himself in the middle of an investigation involving three dead outfitters, and although someone is quickly charged with the crime, Joe is far from satisfied. Digging deeper seems to be an unpopular choice both with the locals and his federal department, and the more attention Joe gives this case, the more trouble he is bringing down upon himself and his family.
This is an excellent introduction to what looks to be a great series. Joe Pickett is far from a super man, but he is an admirable, honest person trying to do the right thing. The setting, although fictional is all to easy to pinpoint on a map, snuggled in against the scenic Big Horn Mountains of Wyoming. The last third of this book really keep me on the edge of my seat, and jumped this book up another notch in my appreciation. Intelligent with good-pacing and an excellent sense of place, Open Season will soon be followed by book number two.
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daughters, and his job. Unfortunately he finds himself in the middle of an investigation involving three dead outfitters, and although someone is quickly charged with the crime, Joe is far from satisfied. Digging deeper seems to be an unpopular choice both with the locals and his federal department, and the more attention Joe gives this case, the more trouble he is bringing down upon himself and his family.
This is an excellent introduction to what looks to be a great series. Joe Pickett is far from a super man, but he is an admirable, honest person trying to do the right thing. The setting, although fictional is all to easy to pinpoint on a map, snuggled in against the scenic Big Horn Mountains of Wyoming. The last third of this book really keep me on the edge of my seat, and jumped this book up another notch in my appreciation. Intelligent with good-pacing and an excellent sense of place, Open Season will soon be followed by book number two.
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LibraryThing member JudyGibson
It's been a long time since I've read a whole book in one day! This one had me in its grip from page one. I like the setting--Wyoming wilderness--and the characters--a game warden and his family (though most of the rest are pretty ugly)--in this first of a long series of mysteries by this author.
A big thank you to the person who recommended these books. I'll definitely read more!
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Although I'm not sure the complex chain of events holds together perfectly, it keeps on moving.A big thank you to the person who recommended these books. I'll definitely read more!
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Awards
Edgar Award (Nominee — First Novel — 2002)
LA Times Book Prize (Finalist — Mystery/Thriller — 2001)
Anthony Award (Nominee — First Novel — 2002)
Macavity Award (Winner — First Novel — 2002)
Barry Award (Winner — First Novel — 2002)
Language
Original language
English
Original publication date
2002-05-07
Physical description
6.7 inches
ISBN
042518546X / 9780425185469