Open Season (A Joe Pickett Novel Book 1) Kindle Edition

Open Season by C.J. Box shows how far a Wyoming Game Warden goes to protect his family.Can Joe bring back the peaceful aura around his home again?Joe PickettJoe Pickett is the new Game Warden for Twelve Sleep, Wyoming, and he has a family. Marybeth is his wife and is pregnant with their third child. Sheridan is their oldest child, the apple of Joe's eye. Then they have Lucy, who is their youngest. This small family has been through a lot before coming to this small peaceful town. Well, as peaceful as one can get when it's full of hunters and people who are used to their game warden being a certain way.Once a guy is found dead on his woodpile behind his home, it gets personal for Joe. His home is his sanctuary, especially with two young kids and a baby on the way. Even more, for his family's sake, Joe wants to bring back the peacefulness they feel at their home, like it's a place that will protect them from harm despite being far from town.The MysterySheridan saw the monster, aka a man, that was dying by her window and saw him stumble to the woodpile—not thinking anything about it, except as a nightmare, and telling her sister about it in the morning with her dad in the room. Joe finds the dead body on his wood pile and calls the sheriff's department. The sheriff investigates as well as he can and thinks he has solved it when they find two more dead bodies and an easy suspect to pin it on. Joe doesn't think it's that easy and decides to investigate it himself. I admit I watched the first season of Joe Pickett on Paramount+ before reading this book, but even I was still surprised at how Joe solved it. The book is definitely different from the show.Five StarsI am giving Open Season by C.J. Box five stars and only recommend it to people who are 18 or older. Mr. Box has written an excellent book that is definitely a crime thriller and should only be read by people that can stomach its contents.Thank you for dropping by! I hope you enjoyed this review of Open Season by C.J. Box.Until the next time,Karen the BaronessIf you would like to see other reviews like this one, check out Baroness Book Trove.

I decided to read these books after I watch the television show. I've only read the first one and it was fantastic! It does have some unnecessary language and some vulgar descriptions that could have been left out. Not a lot of either, but still enough to raise an eyebrow as to why it's there. Anyway, great book! Just ordered the second book.

I’m a frequent visitor to Wyoming, but the coronavirus put the kibosh on this year’s trip, so I decided to enjoy the next best thing by reading some Wyoming literature. Wyoming native C. J. Box has written a series of at least twenty mystery novels set in his home state that showcase the crime solving skills of game warden Joe Pickett. The first installment and Box’s debut novel, Open Season, was published in 2001. This is the first Pickett mystery that I’ve read, but it certainly won’t be my last.Joe Pickett is game warden for the fictional Twelve Sleep County. He lives in the town of Saddlestring, which borrows its name from a real Wyoming town but isn’t really based on that town. Joe is a family man with a wife, two daughters, and another child on the way. The Picketts struggle to make ends meet on a game warden’s salary. Joe is relatively new to his position in Twelve Sleep, but he’s already suffered one embarrassing gaffe on the job. While writing up a citation for poaching, the poacher in question, named Ote Keeley, steals Joe’s weapon from out of his holster. Though the situation is resolved without violence, the story eventually gets out, and it’s a hard thing for a lawman to live down. Months later, the Pickett family hears a disturbance behind their house. When Joe goes out to investigate, he finds the body of Ote Keeley sprawled across his woodpile, shot to death. The local police investigate, but Joe finds their conclusions rather hasty and sketchy, so he decides to look into the case himself.This mystery story is padded with quite a bit of family drama, but that drama is compelling enough to keep the reader interested throughout. Box delivers well-drawn multi-faceted characters, and one really learns a lot about the life of a game warden. The mystery itself is quite intriguing but not an extremely perplexing whodunit. The breadcrumb trail of clues that Box provides makes it possible for the reader to stay a couple steps ahead of Joe at all times. Box is very good at building suspense, however, which makes this novel ideally suited to a film adaptation. In Open Season, he almost draws that suspense out a little too far, to the point where the reader is about ready to cry, “Get to it already,” but the exciting climactic scenes are a rewarding payoff for the anticipation. Box adds one ingenious element to the story that is handled so plausibly he’ll have you Googling to find out whether it’s real or fictional.One of the best things about Box’s writing is that he establishes his setting with a great deal of realism. The natural environment of Wyoming, Joe’s work as a game warden, and the state government bureaucracy are all depicted with a ring of authenticity. The fictional locations, however, counteract this realism; it would have been better had Box set his novels in a real Wyoming county. The story also sacrifices some dignity with a few unnecessarily juvenile sexual references. A certain amount of sleaze often adds necessary spice and atmosphere to a mystery story, but when the grown men in this novel talk about women, they sound like teenagers from the movie Porky’s. Our hero Joe Pickett, thankfully, is not among the offenders.Box’s writing in Open Season calls to mind the crime thrillers of Elmore Leonard, but the Wyoming setting and game warden perspective result in something refreshingly original. This proved to be a fun, thrilling, and even educational read, and I look forward to following more of Joe’s cases.

Item was actually in better condition than described. Arrived quicker than projected. Can’t beat that! Thank you.

Of course it's great! It's CJ Box. How can you go wrong?

Book arrived as scheduled. The book was in like new condition.

This was the first in the Joe Pickett series. I enjoyed the book and will read more on the Pickett series.

I first became aware of C.J. Box when I started watching the Big Sky TV series. Since I love mysteries I decided to try his Joe Pickett books. I enjoyed Open Season although the violence of some characters and the harm to animals disturbed me. The descriptions of Montana were captivating. The portraits of the local animal life were enchanting. Joe Pickett, with his deep humility yet uncompromised integrity, and his family's deeply held values and loyalties were very uplifting to read about.Then I started reading Savage Run and continued watching Big Sky but, unfortunately between those two things, I have decided that I cannot follow C.J. Box anymore. My heart seems to be getting more tender as I age and I cannot cope with what are, to me, so very many almost non-stop egregiously violent characters. It scares me wondering how anyone can even think about such overwhelming evil without being deeply affected. So my advice, as much as I love many of his descriptions, is that other people with tender hearts and who try to see the good in people might want avoid this author for now.

もともとジョーピケットものが好きで、原本を読んでみたいと思い購入した。翻訳より面白い

ワイオミングの雄大な自然を背景に、自然を愛し、家族を大切にし、信念と良心に忠実な狩猟監視官Joe Pickettが、ピックアップトラックと馬に乗って颯爽と登場です。　釣りや狩りが趣味や生活の中心となっている保守的だが平和な土地で、狩猟シーズンの始まりとともに、殺人事件も幕を開けて・・・。　主人公はなんといっても、大自然とアウトドア男の魅力です。　牧童やフィッシングガイドを経て、ロッキー山脈の旅行企画会社のCEOまで至った、著者ならではの作品と言えるでしょう。　しかしいかんせん、端からサスペンスをねらうつもりがないかのようにネタ見せがあり、事件やストーリーが一目瞭然で、ミステリーと呼ぶにはあまりにも・・・。 脚本を練り直して、映画で見たい作品です。　あるいは著者は、観光のための宣伝をねらって、最初からそのつもりだったのでしょうか?

Ok, so I’m taking being late to the party to a whole new level here, but I’ve just discovered the Joe Pickett series by C.J. Box – just as he’s about to release book number 18!! What attracted me to this series was a review for the forthcoming release (The Disappeared) by fellow Book Blogger/Reviewer – The Real Book Spy. There was something about the review that made my ears prick up and think I was going to like the series. So, after much humming and hawing, I decided to head back to where it all began, Book #1 – Open Season.The book is set in the mountains of Wyoming, where we meet Game Warden Joe Picket and his family. I’m a big fan of books set in the great outdoors of the USA, being a long time James Lee Burke fan and following John Sandford’s ‘Virgil Flowers’ as he heads into the country, so it was no surprise to me that I liked this particular setting. I guess what did surprise me was just how much I liked it! Whether it was that sense of escapism (I think I’ve always wanted to live in a cabin by the woods), or it was the way that Box wrote about Picket and his young family, it just seemed to resonate with me on some level.The story itself was an interesting one based around a number of murdered outfitters (experienced hunter type people, to the UK city folks among us) and the discovery of a long thought extinct animal. In all honesty, I Just found the description of the people, land, and way of life absolutely fascinating – to the extent the story almost played second fiddle to the characters, with the location being a character in its own right. That said, it was a well put together tale that concluded with a heart in mouth showdown with Joe and the bad guy. The only negative I will give, and it’s a small one, is that I had figured things out pretty quickly on who the main antagonist was – but I suspect that was down to a fairly small number of potential bad guys more than my detective skills!As I was making my way through the book, I knew it was a series and a family that I just had to get to know better. I imagine it’s a hard thing for a writer to have the reader genuinely care about a family of characters so much in the first book in a series, but Box has somehow managed that with some ease on this one. The epilogue was one of the longer ones I have read, and it gave the reader the chance to get to see how Joe’s family tried to settle back to normality and put all past events behind them, which was a fantastic way to round up a superb character driven story.It’s not often I finish a book and have to fight the urge to just dive straight into the next one in the series, but with this one, I had to battle hard. I’m so happy I decided to start at book 1 in this series as now I have 17 (yes…SEVENTEEN) books left to devour!!Brilliant, just loved it!!

Open Season is the first of C.J.Box's "Joe Pickett" series, and the second that I've read - having been attracted to Free Fire after reading an article on the real-life virtues of the plot. If you like crime thrillers, a taste of the old west, and nature - then the Joe Pickett books are for you!In Open Season, Joe Pickett is a Wyoming game warden preparing for the start of antelope season. As he prepares pancakes for his pregnant wife and two daughters, his eldest tells him of the monster she saw in the yard during the night. In an attempt to show her nothing is there, Joe discovers the dead body of a shady outfitter and an empty cooler that clearly contained an animal of some kind.One murder soon becomes three, and Joe finds himself in the firing line and under investigation for a prior mistake. As talks of the endangered species act, a profitable gas pipeline, and the local sheriff election somehow become linked to Joe's fate, he realises time, and nobody else is on his side.This being g the second Joe Pickett book I've read this year, it's safe to say I like them. They are fast paced, seeped in the crime genre, and beautifully describe the wonderful Wyoming landscape. That said, I am not a huge fan of Joe himself. He's stubborn, old-fashioned, and a little dated as a character.That said, I loved Sheridan, his eldest daughter. You really feel her plight and emotional turmoil. And I've never wanted the villain to get it so badly as a result.A great read only slightly marred by out-of-date characterisation and the odd cliche.

I have read the first seven books in the Joe Pickett series, hoping I could find the "magic" that gets him five star reviews, but I have failed.Joe Pickett is a boring and quite inept character.The plots are at best fanciful, at worse the result of a poor imagination and little research.Definitely not books you are reluctant to put down , I found myself skip reading to find some interesting event or dialogue, that din't work either.