Blood Trail

by C.J. Box

Book Overview

Don't miss the JOE PICKETT series--now streaming on Paramount+ It's elk season in the Rockies, but a different kind of hunter is stalking prey in this novel in the #1 New York Times bestselling Joe... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0399154884
• ISBN13: 9780399154881
• Release Date: May 2008
• Publisher: G. P. Putnam's Sons
• Length: 301 Pages
• Weight: 1.17 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.2" x 6.3" x 9.3"
• Age Range: 18 years and up
• Grade Range: Postsecondary and higher

Customer Reviews

For anyone who likes mysteries

It's a good year indeed when we are blessed with two books by C. J. Box. The stand-alone work BLUE HEAVEN was published early in 2008 and garnered a hint of the commercial success that Box has deserved since he first began setting pen to paper with OPEN SEASON. The newly released BLOOD TRAIL, his latest Joe Pickett novel, provides a point for jumping onto the series for those readers who have yet to become acquainted with this addicting character. Pickett's appeal is his fallibility. He is competent, capable, dogged and determined. But his seeming penchant for accidentally destroying government vehicles (he averages about one a year) has earned him the enmity of his former boss, Randy Pope, when he was a state game warden and was one of many reasons why he was fired from that position. At the same time, Pickett is extraordinarily lucky. For one thing, he's still alive, still married to a wonderful woman, and, thanks to the somewhat vague reasoning of Wyoming governor Spencer Rulon, still employed by the state. Rulon is a crusty, eccentric customer who is used to shooting from the hip and aiming with instinct. He has appointed Pickett to a special position as a game warden at large in Wyoming, reporting only to the governor's office. On a rare day off, Pickett is called in to investigate the grisly murder of a hunter whose body is found field dressed and mounted at a mountain camp. The investigation throws Pickett together with Pope, his former boss and eternal nemesis, as well as Phil Kiner, the man who replaced Pickett as the game warden of the Saddlestring District. As the men make an uneasy, and not always successful, attempt to maintain a civil relationship during the course of their investigation, it slowly becomes clear that whoever is responsible for the hunter's murder is also to blame for two other hunting deaths that had been classified as accidents. When Rulon ends hunting season early, chaos erupts in a state that is heavily dependent upon hunting revenues for its livelihood. To make matters worse, a radical environmentalist who champions anti-hunting initiatives appears in the state and begins conducting efforts that actually encourage the killer. Pickett's investigation leads him to believe that there is an invisible link that joins the murdered hunters, but is doubly surprised to find that the murder victims are connected to a case from his own past and to that of his enigmatic friend Nate Romanowski. As the mysterious killer, who seemingly has the ability to hide in plain sight, continues the string of murders, Pickett embarks on a dangerous and ultimately deadly course to see that justice, however roughly, is done. By the time BLOOD TRAIL concludes, Pickett's life and circumstances are forever and irrevocably changed. C. J. Box, to put it simply, is a marvelous author, worth reading and keeping for every book, every word, that he writes. It appears that the under-appreciation he and his quietly stunning work have received to

C.J. Box's BLOOD TRAIL Owes Me a Night's Sleep

BLOOD TRAIL, featuring Mr. Box's folksy Joe Pickett, perfectly blends mesmerizing suspense, unique characters, a non-stop, action-filled, twisting plot into a page-turning fervor. I told my wife (who has also read all of the author's previous novels) that I was going to stay up an extra hour to finish BLOOD TRAIL. The conclusion was so dynamic, even to the very last page, when I finally crawled into bed I could not fall asleep. My mind had been permanently transcended into the deep woods of Wyoming. Visions of Joe Pickett, Nate Romanowski, Randy Pope and the many other deftly crafted characters continued to stir my thoughts. I heartily agree with the other reviewers that BLOOD TRAIL is Mr. Box's most compelling novel to date...and one of the best I have read all year!

Excellent police procedural

Joe Pickett loved being the game warden of the Saddlestring District, but he was fired by Randy Pope, the Wyoming State Director. Now he is a troubleshooter for the governor and a substitute for game wardens throughout the state who are ill or on vacation. Currently it is elk hunting season; one of the hunters has been killed, skinned, and found tied upside down to a tree branch missing his head. The governor wants Joe to find the perpetrator before he is forced to close state lands from hunters and ask the Feds to do likewise. Unlike his usual on the job distant professionalism, Pope is hands on leading the investigation. When they go into the woods tracking the killer, he is missing though his friend is there as back-up. The tracker is killed. At about the same time shots are fired and Randy's friend dies. Activist Klamath Moore, some feds feels terrorist is more descriptive, and his wife Shannon arrive in town stirring up those people against hunting because he believes killing animals for sports is ethically apprehensible. Joe begins to figure out what is going on when he gets his friend Nate released from federal custody but he doesn't want to believe where the evidence points. . The Joe Pickett police procedurals are unique action-packed thrillers starring a hero who thinks outside of the box, which is why he lost his job. The villain is multifaceted as he is leaving a message behind for hunters who will NRA the killer with disdain and readers who will feel sorry for that person. However, this is Joe's series and he is determined to bring justice to the killer knowing that this time it will hurt badly as he sympathizes with the culprit and believes he may know the person. Using a secondary character, C .J. Box also warns the audience that the natural beauty of the parks are in jeopardy by those whose strategic planning is less than fifteen minutes as instant satisfaction is all that matters. Harriet Klausner

Blood Trail is bloody great

In my opinion, Joe Pickett is becoming one of the great characters of modern American crime fiction, approaching the likes of Michael Connelly's Harry Bosch and even James Lee Burke's Dave Robicheaux. All of them are strong but vulnerable, stubborn, idealistic, and singularly unimpressed with the bureaucrats and politicians they must sometimes answer to. They're also distinct renegades unafraid to buck the system when justice demands it. In "Blood Trail", the eighth Joe Pickett novel, the Wyoming game warden is forced to work with his nemesis and so-called boss Randy Pope, the soulless head of the game and fish department who fired Pickett in "In Plain Sight." They're appointed by the governor to investigate a series of murders - beginning with the gutted, flayed and beheaded body of a hunter found hanging in a tree - that may have been orchestrated by a fanatical anti-hunting activist. As always, CJ Box expertly evokes the beauty and majesty of his native Wyoming in "Blood Trail", and also presents both sides of the hunting vs animal rights issue without intruding on the story. I think this is one of the more exciting Joe Pickett novels, and it is beautifully written to boot. Also recommended: A Stranger Lies There - winner of the Malice Domestic Award for best first mystery, it features a vivid desert backdrop that should please fans of CJ Box's colorful Wyoming settings.

And the hunt is on....

Coming quickly on the heels of the novel Blue Heaven (not a Pickett story) which was released in January, 2008, C. J. Box has published his eighth Joe Pickett novel, Blood Trail. Fast paced with economic prose, packed with suspense and containing more twists and turns than a mountain trail, Blood Trail may be the best of the Pickett novels yet. When hunter Frank Ulman turns up shot, beheaded, field dressed and hung from a tree with a poker chip near by it becomes obvious that he is the third victim of the Wolverine, a sadistic killer who apparently loves to kill hunters. What drives the Woverine? No one is sure. Some speculate that Klamath Moore, an anti-hunting activist may be behind the killings one way or the other. Now working as a special agent who reports directly to the Governor, Joe Pickett is put on the case. But even he hasn't seen anything like the present incident. Blood Trail is sure to keep you guessing. This is an excellent beach read. Peace always