As Snakebit: A Mike Bowditch Short Mystery by Paul Doiron begins, a woman has called Maine Game Warden Mike Bowditch to report that she saw a rattlesnake. She claims to have seen it during her hike on Black Cat Mountain. Considering there have not been any natural occurring rattlesnakes in Maine in decades as well as the fact she does have pictures and refused to give her name or any other information and got angry quickly, Mike Bowditch doesn’t believe her. He soon has an opportunity to reconsider that thought when hours later he is awakened with news of the fact that a teenager has been bit while attending a keg party in the nearby woods. Something is going on and Bowditch is going to get to the bottom of it in this novella.

The read also includes the first three chapters of the next book in the series, Dead Man’s Wake.

As to the novella, this is a solidly good read. Set in an earlier time of the series when Game Warden Mike Bowditch is only 27 years old (“..take place in the weeks before KNIFE CREEK…” per the author’s Facebook post of May 26th), the tale is complicated, and moves forward at a fairly rapid pace. For those of us long familiar with the series, it is an enjoyable read. For those new to these books, Snakebit: A Mike Bowditch Short Mystery is a good taste of why these reads are so good.

My eBook reading copy came by way of purchase using funds in my Amazon Associate account.

Kevin R. Tipple ©2023 ( )