(2013) Very good story as Joe tries to find a neigbbor Butch Robeson who is accused of murdering 2 EPA agents. Joe finds him just after an EPA official (Bautista) has used a drone missle which kills the wrong man and in turn creates a wildfire. Joe and Butch try to escape the fire thru a sheer canyon. In the end he determines that Bautista is pursuing revenge for Butch taking a girl in college that he thought was his. Also Butch's daughter Hannah is the actual shooter of the two agents when she thought they were going to kill her father. Joe winds up with no job in the end, so on to the next book.KIRKUS REVIEWWyoming Fish and Game Warden Joe Pickett, who attracts trouble the way carcasses attract maggots (Force of Nature, 2012, etc.), gets in the line of fire between an old friend and the Feds.When two EPA agents, sent all the way from Denver to take contractor Butch Roberson into custody. are shot to death, Butch himself is the obvious suspect. But Joe, who saw Butch only hours before he disappeared, can't help wondering why the EPA was so interested in Butch, whose attempt to build a new house for his family in Aspen Highlands blew up in his face, and why the new, race-baiting EPA regional director Juan Julio Batista has taken such a personal interest in the case. Joe has no time for any speculations, though, before he's pressed into service to lead an ill-equipped EPA party searching for Butch up the mountain where he was last seen. Little does Joe know that he's not the only one on the hunt. His old nemesis, ex-Sheriff Kyle McLanahan, has heard the rumor of a big reward for bringing in Butch and has gotten Dave Farkus, a clueless employee Butch fired, to lead him and Jimmy Sollis, the no-account brother of slain deputy Trent Sollis, to Butch first. Box doles out complications and misfortunes with masterly control; each time you're convinced things can't get any worse for Butch or Joe, they do, usually in unexpected ways. And every twist tightens the analogy between the shiftless vigilantes after Butch and the Feds determined to capture or kill him, two parties that are not only equally villainous, but villainous in exactly the same way.Its basis in a real-life conflict makes Joe's 13th case one of his most tendentious, but it's Box who makes it one of his most exciting.Pub Date: March 12th, 2013ISBN: 978-0-399-16075-2Page count: 384ppPublisher: PutnamReview Posted Online: Jan. 22nd, 2013Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1st, 2013

This was one of the better ones. I enjoyed the story. ( )

just read this and back of beyond in June. Was in the mood for wilderness thrillers and now am in the mood for the latest Ace Atkins...hopefully then I can get into the most recent Hex Hall or Kitty rocks the house...restless summer. Miss Sallie Bissell and would give just about anything for a new C Cain to keep my mind buzzing. ( )

This was an excellent adventure mystery. I would have enjoyed it more if I hadn't read it out of order. Somehow I thought it was the second book in the series, but it is the 13th. More background on the character development would have been nice. However, I still love the Wyoming wilderness and small town setting, and the good strong people who inhabit it. Great writing, good story. Now to seek out book #2. ( )

I have read a couple of Joe Pickett novels and enjoyed them. This one, however, is awful. A trite plot twist, a not believable motive, the ubiquitous modern deus ex machina of the computer hacker, and a "jump the shark" use of a Hellfire missile.
Box seems to have run out of creative gas. ( )