Below Zero [Hardcover]

Below Zero is a sequel to Box's third Joe Pickett novel Winterkill. Well it's a sequel to 7 others as well, but the ending of those ones isn't given away as Winterkill's plot is in Below Zero. So I'd highly recommend reading that one first, in fact, I'd suggest reading the whole series in order which starts with Open Season. Their order is at the bottom of this review. All can be read as standalone reads, but once you've read one, you'll want to read them all so you might as well read them in order and experience Pickett's family grow and his career, well not really grow but you'll experience it's ups and downs.

In Below Zero, a school boy now living in the Pickett family's old home, trying to impress Joe's daughter, passes her mobile number onto a mysterious caller. That caller will shortly after text Sheridan claiming she is April, a foster sister who the family thought was dead. Meanwhile Joe posted to the outskirts of the state for his past actions (read the former novels) is out to apprehend after rescuing a victim, the Mad Archer, a particularly grade A environmental lowlife, who seems to enjoy shooting arrows into wildlife and leaving them to die. When Joe learns of the texts to his daughter, he immediately takes personal leave and rushes back, set to do whatever he can to find out if April is April, which doesn't seem likely. When he learns the girl claims she is travelling with two men who are doing bad things such as killing people (unbeknownst to Pickett killing in the name of reducing carbon footprints of those who substantially pollute with no regard for the planet), he is determined to rescue her this time round.

1. Open Season (2001)
2. Savage Run (2002)
3. Winterkill (2003)
4. Trophy Hunt (2004)
5. Out of Range (2005)
6. In Plain Sight (2006)
7. Free Fire (2007)
8. Blood Trail (2008)
9. Below Zero (2009)
10. Nowhere to Run (2010)

If you've read all the Joe Pickett novels, I'd also suggest the author Ben Rehder. Buck Fever is book one in a series of adventures set in Blanco County Texas with a very similar character to Joe Pickett in game warden John Marlin who could practically be his twin separated at birth and sent to Texas.

I have read all the Joe Pickett novels in sequence. I am finding that the most recent ones need a greater infusion of reality. Below Zero has all kinds of contemporary touches: cold hospitals that seem more interested in insurance coverage than the patient's recovery, carbon footprints and the death of Planet Earth, abused foster-care children, text messaging, and survivalist cults. They cannot rescue, however, a lame, contrived, and unbelievable plot. Box has done much better.

Action has to come from motivation and motivation has to come from character. The villainous father-son duo were not credible. We've all read of dysfunctional family dynamics, but this is one time when fiction is stranger than reality. Another reviewer got it right when writing that Carl Hiasen has done this kind of madcap picaresque much better because he does it with wit, irony, and insight.

I also agree with another reviewer that the Pickett family dynamics are getting tired and tiresome. It's time to send Sheridan and Lucy off to college. They now impede the narrative. We got the point long ago that Joe Pickett is an old fashioned, decent and loving family man.

As Joe Pickett's actions have gotten more and more displaced from game wardening, there has been a loss of what first made Box such a fresh and engaging author. The Wyoming and Western landscape and culture have been central characters in his best writing. I found the early part of this book that dealt with wildlife and the outdoors to be the most engaging along with those sections where Nate Romanski appears.

This was my first box/pickett novel. It was interersting and exciting enough that I got through it, and cared what happened, although it was implausible and the "twist" near the end was not all the interesting or relevant--and wasn't even all that surprising. You do stretch credibility, though, when you're chasing a known mob gangster and say, hey! Why don't I bring my daugther along! No, I don't think so.