2008, G.P. Putnam’s Sons

$24.95 hardbound, 301 pages

.

Here’s a book that probes some of the less-noticed wounds of America’s culture wars with all the delicacy of a 105 mm howitzer.

It’s part of a series of eight detective/mystery novels about a Wyoming game warden, Joe Pickett, who works directly for the governor — a Democrat, oddly enough — named Spencer Rulon.

In this story, someone’s killing hunters and mutilating their bodies in particularly nasty ways. With a state economy that depends so much on the hunting industry, Rulon gets Pickett involved in the hunt for the hunter who hunts hunters.

Sorry, couldn’t resist.

Along the way, Pickett encounters a bureaucratic martinet, a quirky manhunter, recent Iraq War vets, a-little-too-virtuous Native Americans and radical anti-hunting activists. The latter group’s leader, with the improbable name of Klamath Moore, cheers the killer’s work, ostensibly from the sidelines.

Box, who visited Davis Kidd in Memphis on June 2, does a good job of carrying the story along and making us care about the characters. In theme, it reminds me a little of Nevada Barr’s Anna Pigeon novels.

The ending, however, is frankly hard to swallow. Suffice it to say that I don’t see how a killer who’s been so smart from the beginning became so dumb as to fall into this trap.

Nevertheless, I’d give this mystery a thumbs up. I’ll probably check out the previous books in the series, and I’ll definitely be interested to see what’s next for Joe Pickett.