Nevada Books

JFK, LBJ, MLK, KKK, CIA, FBI, Bobby, Hoffa, J.E. Hoover, Mafia, Vegas, 'Nam, Fidel, Sammy Davis Jr., Howard Hughes, Rock Hudson, hookers, drugs, and more are all woven through this roller coaster of a conspiracy tale that almost plausibly ties together all the crazy and tragic events that shaped American life in the 1960s and for decades after. The story begins in the moments following the assassination of JFK in Dallas and takes the reader on an almost dream-like journey that ends with Bobby's death in Los Angeles. The story told is masterful, if disturbing, and the characters are "insiders" working with the mob and shady elements within the Federal government to drive the bloody historical events of that period.

Ellroy uses an unusal writing style in this novel which relies on snippets or fragments of thought rather than full sentences to tell the story. Short two, three or four word bursts which describe the action in a way that is effective and gritty, though not necessarily smooth. The result is a read which is compelling, but not leisurely or relaxing. Despite the effort it takes to get through it at times, it is very hard to put down. When you are done, you can finally breathe a sigh of relief and head back to Amazon.com to see what else this guy has written!

Novels such as `The Black Dahlia', `L.A Confidential', `American Tabloid' and `White Jazz `along with his personal testimony `My Dark Places' have elevated ex-junkie drop-out James Elroy to a colossus of American literature and eminent man of letters. Or, as a currently interred bank robber acquaintance of mine recently put it, `His name should be mentioned in the same breath as Steinbeck.'
Elroy's world, littered as it is, with gangsters, pimps, hookers, movie stars, racists and politicians has basically mugged the retro-pulp of Chandler, Thompson and Spillane and run with his kill-gotten gains straight over the wild side and into the abyss of the American nightmare.

His latest `The Cold Six Thousand' is an epic journey; book-ended by the Kennedy assassinations of 63 and 68. Fact and fiction collide as father hating cop Wayne Tedrow Jnr finds himself embroiled in the JFK conspiracy and the vortex of world shaking tragedies that followed. The men that made modern America flicker before us like a scratched Super 8 of moral degeneracy and decay as Howard Hughes, J. Edgar Hoover, LBJ, The Klan, Jimmy Hoffa, The CIA, The Mob, The FBI, Fidel Castro, Sam Giancana, Sonny Liston, Martin Luther King and James Earl Ray lie, cheat, maim and kill, against an horrific tableaux on par with the hellish depictions of painter Hieronymus Bosch.

With the' The Cold Six Thousand' Elroy appears to have split his critics with its almost impenetrable staccato stylings and hipster-speak which would be more at home in the mouths of the 50's beatniks - certainly the delivery is at odds with the timbre of the books corporate gangsters and hoodlum politicians. It's almost as if Elroy was in such a hurry to tell the story that he barely had time to write it - an epileptic Jack Kerouac on an amphetamine comedown.

`The Cold Six Thousand' is, never-the-less, a terrifying thrill ride through an era which has branded world events ever since. Those five terrifying years in which the world was apparently swinging was, if this book is anything to go by, actually `Turning on, tuning in and dropping out' towards annihilation. Today's America was forged in the fires of that terrible half decade and I can hardly wait for Oliver Stone to commit it to celluloid so we can all rest easy and say... "It's only a film."

The Cold Six Thousand is a daringly direct take on the biggest events in America in the 1960s - the assassinations of President John F Kennedy, civil rights leader Martin Luther King and JFK's younger brother Senator Robert F Kennedy. All this set against the first few years of the US involvement in Vietnam, the cold war and the stand-off with Cuba, with considerable influence from such figureheads as FBI Director J Edgar Hoover, eccentric billionaire Howard Hughes and the leading dons of the US Mafia.



Officially we know who killed JFK, MLK and RFK, but after reading this sprawling novel, sequel to the even better American Tabloid, you may wonder if the author's version of events is closer to the truth. All of the 'official' guilty parties feature, including Palestinian activist Sirhan Sirhan who I believe is still in a California jail some 40 years on....but did he pull the trigger of the gun that killed Bobby Kennedy? This novel doesn't specifically and unambiguously answer that question, but Ellroy is in no doubt at all as to who was behind the presidential assassination.



If taken literally (which is difficult not to do) it's impossible not to be disgusted at the extraordinary levels of corruption, racism and political manipulation that lay behind the face of the United States in the Swinging Sixties. The Ku Klux Klan were highly influential in CIA strategy, and although the political impetus behind the US involvement in Vietnam is somewhat glossed over (Linden B Johnson barely has a talking part, unlike JFK in American Tabloid), the CIA's heroin processing 'business' is documented in great detail, as one of the three primary characters Wayne Tedrow Junior (a former policeman) becomes primarily responsible for the labs set up in Vietnam and Laos for creating a massive 'White Horse' production line which has at least two key objectives - to establish a distribution network in Las Vegas among negroes only, and to finance 'The Cause' : collaboration with the Mafia in their attempts to overthrow Castro in Cuba and repossess their casinos which they had invested so much money into.



The other two lead characters, Ward Littell and Pete Bondurant, are carried over from American Tabloid, and for me one of the best features of both books is the description of how the lives and personalities of these two men are shaped and changed by their murderous activities. These men are cold-blooded killers with soft hearts - and in Bondurant's case a rather weak one.



In a way it's amazing that so much history has been squeezed into one riveting novel; if you know nothing about the truth on which it's based it still makes compelling reading, but if (like me) you are among the many who want to know what really happened back then, this story will probably satisfy on another level, and put the whole sordid series of events into some kind of perspective.



I cannot miss this opportunity to add that there appears to be a case for an allegation of history repeating itself, with the US invading Iraq under the one context while the world was/is convinced that the real motive was to get its hands on a valuable commodity. Back in the 1960s, it was a US invasion of another country cloaked under the paranoia of Communism (as opposed to terrorism today) while the commodity of choice back then was heroin. Ellroy finished The Cold Six Thousand only a year or so before the US started the Iraq War - now his words have a sense of prophetic familiarity.



Truly a must-read.

Vivid, vicious, hyper-masculine and uber-stylish, the novel begins on the day Kennedy is killed and follows three men tied up in his assassination through the next five years, culminating with the killings of RFK and MLK. Cameos by J. Edgar Hoover, Jimmy Hoffa, Sonny Liston, Howard Hughes and others speak to the depth of research Ellroy has put into play. The word "ambitious" isn't near strong enough for this one -- it's a classic, a novel that deserves study.

Ellroy's characters are always strong symbols, and between them, the three protagonists span the gamut of American hope and horror. I particularly found Ward Littell fascinating; a brilliant lawyer who works tirelessly for the both mob and Howard Hughes, yet mollifies his conscience by skimming from both to funnel anonymous donations to Martin Luther King.

Highly recommended.

Dig it: James heard the cheers. James wanted more. James wanted to be a "serious" writer. He birthed a book in his brain. The train to get him there.

There you have it: The "literary" style of The Cold Six Thousand. In a nutshell.

Armed with James' knowledge of American history, I could have written this novel. So much of the book follows the same pattern: Write a sentence with few words. Write a similar sentence. Write another similar sentence. Then flip it up with a different sentence. Variation for Six-Thousand in this regard meant occasionally using three sentences instead of four. And on and on it went.

To be fair, every now and then Ellroy did have nice turns of phrase ensconced within this repetition. But it seems he got so amused with his own style that he overloads the reader with an abundance of people and places and slang and events. The story becomes muddled in the process. I'm not one to admit that reading must be easy, but come on, at least it needs to be clear. Ellroy fails in this regard.

I respect Ellroy and know he can knock it out of the park, but I feel letdown with this book. Why did he seek the recognition of literary writers to begin with? Was he not happy with his reputation as one of the hippest and most commanding voices in crime fiction? Literary fiction, in my opinion, has always been easy to write. I should know: I used to crank out the artsy product myself, and to acclaim at that. Genre writing, on the other hand, is tough business. Why did Ellroy decide to jump from the Black Diamond of fiction to the Bunny Slope? If you want a satisfying read, don't buy this book.

this is my first dekker novel. A friend recommended it. It really sucks. Clumsy, peurile, cliched and hokey.

This book was very good at making you turn pages quickly...

but it lacked a powerful punch at the end. :(

While this isn't my favorite of Ted Dekker's books, it's definitely a fun read while sitting on the beach. The story grabs you immediately, and keeps you hooked throughout. I enjoyed trying to figure out where the story was going through all the twists and turns. Now that I've read more of his books, I also get a kick out where many of his books cross paths with each other. I think Ted Dekker is a brilliant and imaginative writer, and I appreciate his efforts in trying to get his readers to think about the underlying message of his stories. I also realize that many of his villians are exceptionally gross, but then, so is evil when it's exposed for what it is. This book is still a good read.

This book was an amazing breakthrough for Ted's career. Writing a book for the secular market was a smart move because it will cause readers that may be non-believers to want to read his other material that has more Christian-themed messages. In many interviews, Ted Dekker specifically said he was not writing this book to have obvious spiritual concepts but was targeting secular audiences with the simple message of getting past the skin of this world or the external appearance of a person to find out what's really underneath. Yes, the book contains some typos and may seem a bit rushed, but you have to understand what a prolific writer Ted is and the number of books he writes in the space of one year is unprecedented. Overall, it was an awesome, trippy ride. Get this book.

I'll keep this short and simple: This is the first (and probably last) Ted Dekker novel I've read. The book is horrible: the plot is ridiculous (and extremely implausible in the end), the characters are flat, and the narrative is amateurish...Anyone who gave this book 4 or 5 stars either didn't read the novel or will give 5 stars to a phone book.

Having read a good many books in this series I found High Country suffered from a couple of sequences that lost some of their sharpness due to their protracted length - perhaps some more agressive editing was called for - but that is a hard thing for some editors to do, giving the author's pervious successes. In addition the drug plane idea has been used by others so lacked the drama that might otherwise accompany the "find".

What raises this book above the average in my opinion, is the growth that the protagonist, Ranger Anna Pigeon undergoes in this story. One thing that bothered me about this very human and likable character was that I shared book after book with her and yet she wasn't really changing, not inside, no character developement, even while her life and career continued to evolve. How ironic that in this book where she is undercover, without a real identiy, that she actually does some subtle and seriously profound thinking about who she really is. Or perhaps this is not so ironic. When robbed of all she is and all she has ever been, when set adrift in humanity on the thin veneer of lies, when no one knows who you are, when every act is completely married with falsehood, then it is that Anna finds what she misses most, is herself.

Her experience waiting tables in college lands park ranger Anna Pigeon in an undercover assignment in food services at Yosemite National Park. Four of the park's employees have gone missing, and the rangers in the park aren't finding any leads. Anna is rooming with a couple of fluffhead girls while posing as a middle-aged waitress, but even her proximity to the other employees can't make her fit in. When one of her roommates collapses after getting high on something, Anna becomes concerned. Some odd men claiming to be friends of one of the missing employees have taken over his cabin, and their presence, along with mountains of gear, coupled with a snippet of overheard conversation and a single-line note from a missing woman to her brother, send Anna on a wilderness hike that very nearly ends her life when she stumbles across a big secret.

Though I wouldn't be so ungenerous as to say the book fell flat, it was definitely missing a vital ingredient usually present in these adventures. Anna spent an inordinate amount of time being hunted by killers in the wilderness and not enough putting things together. The villains were also perhaps a tad too sadistic, and they roughed Anna up a little more than necessary. In all, though it wasn't my favorite Anna Pigeon mystery, it was still a decent chapter in her saga.

I got this unabridged Nevada Barr CD/novel for an avid Anna Pigeon Mystery fan...and it "fit the bill" as a satisfying gift to give. The Giftee was mighty pleased.

I was hooked on Anna Pidgeon's Track of the Cat, and have devotedly purchased and read everything that Nevada Barr has written, especially the Anna Pidgeon books. But ever since Flashback, Nevada's books have been lacking in the excitement that has made the Anna Pidgeon books so addicting. I know, since reading Seeking Enlightenment...Hat by Hat, that Nevada has had a change in faith, and I wonder if it has not been reflected in her writing, since Anna has seemed to have this same kind of change come over her.

I have worked with many rangers as a docent for the parks system, and even in aging, none has seemed to carry aging to such a dark, dismal place as Nevada has written for Anna. Nevada needs to remember that age is not chronological, but spirtual, and if she wants people to keep reading her Anna Pidgeon books, she needs to stop aging Anna.

The draw of Nevada's books for me have been her travelogue of the national parks as much as the mystery of the novel. I have been given such a clear and perfect picture of each of the parks, that when I visit them, it seems as though I have already been there. This was not true for Yosemite. I grew up visiting Yosemite, and this book was so inaccurate, I would have thought I was visiting another place. First of all, walking in the wintertime from the Ahwanhee to Camp Curry or Yosemite Lodge would have caused hypothermia.

Nevada seemed hurried in writing this novel, and she seemed unable to decide on whether to develop the plot, or develop the park description, so she did neither. I would love to give her a redo on this, because based on the other reviews, I know she can do better.

Anna, far from home and undercover brings back the classic Nevada Barr we've missed in previous titles. The famous Ahwahnee Hotel in Yosemite National Park is the location of Anna's new position, slinging hash. Barr reminds us of the aching feet, sore muscles, and endurance one must execute to keep a smile on your face under those eatery conditions.
The vivid contrast between undercover conditions and hike into the splendor of the mountains is vintage Barr as so many readers have used her stories as tour guides to our national treasures.
After all the danger, evil, suspense and injuries, this one gives the reader a fine ending.
Nash Black, author of WRITING AS A SMALL BUINESS and SINS OF THE FATHERS.

I find it hard to believe this author managed to get a book published. She describes the BMW as a $47,000 V8....wrong. '96 750's were V12, and more like $90,000. Difficult to put much faith in whatever else is written when basic facts cannot be nailed down. Scott also describes Run DMC as 'a rapper', good god. One plus, the book is easy to read, because it's written at about a 3rd grade level.

There aren't many actual facts in this book and honestly, this is slipshod work at best. I am very knowledgeable about Tupac Shakur and truthfully, I would have written a better book. The autopsy photo disturbed me greatly and who took that photo anyway? Whoever took the autopsy photo should be shot! I was not at all impressed by Ms. Scott's conjectures that she tried to pass off as facts. This book is a waste of time and money if you're really interested in the death of Mr. Shakur. I wouldn't recommend this book to my neighbor's dog.

2PAC...was,is,and will be forever in our hearts.
I really don't know what to believe:is he death or not...because here,in romania a lot of magazines keep saying that he is not death...why?Just becaue they wanna be close to him,or what?
suspicious events:13th is a day which usually doesn't bring us good news.Interesting is that there weren't any pictures with PAC bleeding.In his song "Life Goes On"he is talking about his own death . The driver of the car,SUGE KNIGHT hasn't been present at the inquiry of the event."i'm not paid to solve murders"said him
The white cadillac in which where the assasins,just after the murder ,passed near PAC's car,but nobody tdyed to stop theme.
His video,"I Ain't Mad At Cha"was released rigt after the shoots.
in that video,2pac was an angel in Heaven...and there are a lot of theories like these...anyway,his lucky number seems to be 7...
Even if they say yhat he isn't death,I think that we should respect him,even in his death!
Keep ya head up and folllow your dreams!
Peace,love and respect for this ANGEL!

I place this book beside another three books on Tupac which I feel are must reads: [1] "Back in the Day" by Darrin Keith Bastfield, [2] "Holler if you hear me" by Michael Eric Dyson, and [3] "Got your back" by Frank Alexander. These three plus Cathy Scott's book paint a complete picture of his life and death. Cathy Scott's book is thoroughly researched but some facts that are commonly excepted as fact are expressed differently by her. It is evident in this book that she wishes she could talk about the investigation into Pac's death but the sad fact is that there is no investigation. Witness's refuse to cooperate and the incidents on the night of his death make the whole situation difficult for the police. Scott tries to circumvent this very hard but in the end she fails. The book also deals with the murders of Biggie, Orlando Anderson, Yafeu Fula and discusses how moronic the "he is alive" theories are as well. Very good book overall and a very quick read.

With so much controversy about his death, I decided to get the facts from this shocking, yet very informative book from acclaimed journalist Cathy Scott.

While also telling you about the man himself, Scott reveals the many flaws in the investigation of the shooting that took place on the night of September 7th, 1996 - the scene of the crime not being secured quick enough, the fatal release of key witness Yafeu Fula, Suge Knight's attorney playing hard to get with Les Vegas Police and the confusion of other witnesses Frank Alexander and Malcolm Greenridge - which makes you wonder just how much effort did police put into this case?

Not just providing the facts, Scott also presents the many possible motives and turns heads to several known suspects. An interesting read, showing you not only a violent, but tragic story about a young man who lived hard and fast all the way to the end. With information on Tupac's background and other events related to him and his murder, you get to know about the man as well as the musician, with additional comments made by various writers - Kevin Powell, Michael Eric Dyson - and those who knew him well - Jasmine Guy, Suge Knight, a moving letter from his Godfather and a final comment from his mother, Afeni Shakur. The book even uncovers the rapper's mystique - his obsession with death, the alive theories and many other strange coincidences.

'The Killing Of Tupac Shakur' is a revelation that will both shock and fascinate you in more ways then one. A must have for Tupac fans.

This one may be for readers who need to know every challenge in Anna Pigeon's career. Perhaps. This is not one of Barr's tightest plots. The wind-up takes awhile. The energy is flat at the beginning. Even after the initial fatality, events lull and sag for a few pages too long. Once energy gets moving and tension builds, however, it comes by the boat-load. "Liberty Falling" is good Anna time - tending to an ill sister, dancing around a "slightly used but still serviceable ex-boyfriend." It's terrific to see Anna with big city tourists, tunneling down in the subway (thinking of her New Mexico cave experience along the way) and walking the mean streets (at times) of New York. All along the way is the deep Pigeon cynicism and wry cracks. "Old bones had a litany of their own, reciting past injuries to any who would listen." "The apparition was either running away or low on ectoplasm," she observes at one point when sounds from a "ghost" grow faint. In this tale Anna sprouts a curious inability to come clean and be forthright with the people she encounters. And, of course, Anna questions why that is. She questions everything. She absorbs everything, as we all know, and Barr fans know what appears to be innocuous detail may very well surface later as the key to the unraveling the source of the danger.

At the core of "Liberty Falling" is a "nasty little story of hatred, fear and ignorance," as Pigeon observes. The ending vaults into high-speed action from sea to land. At one point, while she's soaked in the drink, Pigeon pauses long enough to observe that she isn't James Bond. Well, sure. That's what we like about Pigeon--she's grounded, earthy, self-deprecating and endlessly measuring her own inadequacies. "Liberty Falling" is rich with Pigeon insights. The "mystery" part of this book builds slowly but the ending packs a nifty wallop.

National Park Service agent Anna Pigeon would rather be anywhere other than New York City. However, her sister's critically failing health is more important than her need for wilderness solitude. Fortunately for Anna, Liberty and Ellis islands provide her with critical havens of peace when the crush of humanity overwhelms her. That is, until a fatal tragedy on the Statue of Liberty puts Anna on the scent of a conspiracy, one that becomes increasingly deadly the closer she gets to its center.

Barr does a good job of creating a patchwork quilt of seemingly unrelated clues for Anna to piece together. However, as likeable as Anna is, the clues fall a little too conveniently into her lap, and her investigative skills too often depend on lucky coincidence. This has the unfortunate effect of relieving any sense of tension, since it's always assured the winds of fortune will blow Anna's way when the leads start drying up. (On a minor note, Barr's unique fascination with anatomical references is distracting: for example, Anna getting a tingling in her duodenum.) On the positive side, though, Ellis and Liberty islands are fully realized and absolutely fascinating. By the end of the novel, the reader will probably feel as if he or she has been there. The non-suspense of the mystery is adequately redressed by the genuinely likeable Anna and a pleasant extended tour of Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty.

This is the kind of book that you can skip-read every other page and not miss a thing.

I had read all the earlier and some of the subsequent Anna Pigeon books, and this was the book I was waiting for -- not so much for the mystery as for the subplot.

FINally Anna and Molly have scenes together in person (although Molly is comatose in the first one). FINally, a complicated, face-to-face denouement in the awkward triangle involving Anna and Molly and Frederick the Fed. (F the F is my favorite Nevada Barr character. I wish she had let him remain mysterious, wandering unexpectedly through every third book, sort of like Brenda Starr's Mystery Man. But this new side of FF was fun, too.) And I'm glad Barr gave Anna and Molly something really challenging to their sisterhood to work through.

As for the mystery itself -- OK enough. It was different for me. In the previous books, I was way ahead of Anna in figuring things out and had to watch her walk naively into the clutches of the very person who wanted her dead. In this book, Anna had it figured out and I was (mostly) clueless -- a nice change of formula.

I liked Anna's return to New York in real(?) time, rather than through memories. I work in an urban area where the National Park Service has a presence (Philadelphia), so it didn't seem odd to me. And I really connected to how out of place Anna feels there now.

A family emergency brings Anna Pigeon rushing to New York. Molly, her sister, is gravely ill and in the hospital. Anna unrolls her "sleeping bag" with friends on Liberty Island and discovers accidents are murder. Determined to find answers Anna plunges into the melee ignoring warnings to stay clear.
LIBERTY FALLING is not Nevada Barr's best effort. The intrepid Anna is vulnerable as she haunts the halls of the hospital and fierce in her hunt for those that would destroy an American icon. Maybe it is the contrast of personalities that confuse the reader. But then Nevada Barr, always brings "arm chair travelers a bird's eye-view" of our unique national heritage.
Nash Black, author of WRITING AS A SMALL BUSINESS and SINS OF THE FATHERS.

This book was amazing, Ben writes some gripping and rather amzing stories considering they are nonfiction!

A great tale compellingly told. Would have been nice to have had some of the math exposed in an appendix for those who care, but a grand story

This book is pretty much an advertisement for one of the subject's seminars. So many things in this are clearly fabricated. If a casino sees you make hugely varying bets and coming out ahead, they will ask you to leave, ban you from the casino, then share your picture with the other casinos. It's actually fairly easy to beat blackjack, but it's hard to do it without the casino.

For the longest time, I thought Busting Vegas and Bringing Down the House were the same book with different titles. After not being thrilled with Mezrich's RIGGED, I ran into Busting Vegas at a nearby bookstore and realized that indeed it was a completely different book than BDTH.

I thoroughly enjoyed this very entertaining account of a completely different formula to "Beat the House" than card counting. If you have read Mezrich's other works and enjoyed them, as well as enjoy the game of blackjack, I think you cannot go wrong with this one. The characters are vivid and the story telling is rich and vivid with detail.

if this book were simply an exciting fast-paced story (albeit poorly written), i would rate it 2 stars

unfortunately, about halfway through it goes moralistic with dripping hypocrisy - an unnecessary element i found annoying. an example from page 151:

"'okay,' victor said as he surveyed the group, lined up on the balcony, blue water behind them, the glass casino glowing on the horizon. 'let's show this little island what a bit of math, in the right hands, can do to balance out a few hundred years of economic oppression, shall we?'

semyon grinned, and barely felt the pinch of his still bruised lower lip. robin hood had nothing on them"

just like robin hood - except they keep the money for themselves (MIT/harvard students)

the 'afterword' takes the ridiculous moral justification a few steps further. an example from page 283/4:

"for me and my teammates, beating the casinos has never been entirely about the money. of course the money was important, and on the surface, the whole enterprise may have even resembled a kind of crazy financial start-up on steroids, but anyone looking deeper would have seen that for us, the blackjack team was not a business, but a passionate, desperate struggle against the mighty evil empire that was and continues to be the casino industry... inspired by the success of open source, i've come to believe that to really make a substantial impact against a powerful adversary like the casino industry, you have to sacrifice the short term profits of a select few in order to enable the masses to cooperate and innovate... once this book is published, millions of people will get exposure to some of our key methods"

uhhh.. what?!!!! the book is glammed to the max with regard to gambling (the cover is no anomaly) and somehow it's still a "desperate struggle against the mighty evil empire"? comparing casino cheating to a productive venture - like a startup or successful open source teams - is ridiculous

with a world of other books to read, i do not recommend this one

I personally thought that this was one of Nevada Barr's very best books.It is informative and intertaining at the same time; with some amusing content.I highly recommend this one to any Barr reader, you cant go wrong.

After promising to look up other work by Nevada Barr in my review of `Women On The Case', I picked up `Blood Lure'. The premise sounded interesting: Anna Pigeon on loan to Glacier Nat'l Park to do a study on grizzly bears runs into murder most foul on the camp trail.

Barr's description of the natural beauty and the natural world are full-colored and vibrant. She makes grizzly bear DNA research downright interesting.

Her plotting is crafty indeed, her story trail strewn with misleads and false starts, and thirty pages from the end you're still not exactly sure who the murderer is.

Most of her characters are well-developed and fully-fleshed. Others are less so, but that's the art of the lure---how much do we know about these characters and should we bother or not?

Although I'm not entirely happy with the ending, the tale is well-told and is an enjoyable read.

But I wouldn't advise bringing it on a camping vacation.

I'd probably rank this three stars for plot and five stars for the Anna Pigeon character--always five stars for Anna. It's the integrity of her character, how she thinks and reacts. She is consistent, smart and terribly human. In Blood Lure, the work is an excellent combination of field work and office work. I enjoyed the long passage where Anna hikes alone way up into the wilderness, above timberline. Barr is not afraid to let the trip take time and the descriptions of the mountains and terrain are vivid, fresh and sharp. The puzzle pieces are few. In a way, this is a drawing room mystery splashed across the wide open landscape of Glacier National Park. By the middle of the book, the solution is going to be found down one path or the other and Anna keeps going back and forth between the two, trying to wrestle the facts to the ground in a way that makes senese. And it's that wrestling process that makes her so fascinating, the way in which every new piece of information is viewed, reviewed, considered and kicked around. That said, I found the ending also a bit over-the-top, as others have noted. But I give Barr credit for attempting an unusual situation; I just think the plausiblity factor was stretched to the max.

Nevada Barr's National Park-set mysteries are shelved in my mind with Tony Hillerman's books. Both authors present the landscape they are set in as a major character. The events in their books are shaped by the setting and couldn't happen anywhere else. Having a ranger in the Natural Park Service is a very clever device as it gives Barr the opportunity to move her character from park to park, and have recurring characters and new characters in each book.

In Blood Lure, Anna Pigeon, the park ranger heroine, is shadowing a grizzly bear researcher who is doing a population census of the bears by luring them to leave their hair on scratching posts. First Anna and the researcher are terrorized by a huge rogue bear, and then a body is found.

Blood Lure is one of Barr's more disappointing efforts. Although Glacier National Park is a jewel of the National Park System, it doesn't really come to life the way the Natchez Trace or the Guadalupe Mountains do. The resolution of the murders the park ranger heroine Anna Pigeon uncovers is also unsatisfactory. The situation seems contrived and well, unrealistic. I've read about five in the Anna Pigeon series and they were all more enjoyable. I look forward to sampling others and being able to lose myself in a national park once more.

BLOOD LURE brings Anna Pigeon out of the steamy south to Glacier National Park for a stark contrast in environment. Who killer the step-mother? The famed Grizzly or a more deadly creature? Anna searches for answers while playing the role of a student of DNA research on our largest bear.
Nevada Barr's skills of environmental description are in full swing, but the mystery is lackluster. If this is your first read of the exceptionally fine series, I recommend the first TRACK OF THE CAT or my favorite, FIRESTORM. Then pickup others an excellent series with lots of facts and information that spices the mix.
Nash Black, author of WRITING AS A SMALL BUSINESS and SINS OF THE FATHERS.

Written as a true story, Sara Davidson portrays a sophisticated and creative woman in her 40's, working as a writer on the "Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman" series, a divorcee with kids, who one day meets an illiterate trailer-park young cowboy and falls head over heels in lust.

Their relationship seems doomed from the beginning. Mentally, she could be his mother; in intelligence and educations she was centuries ahead of him; she had kids and other people's opinions to consider; she even needed to teach him where all the sexual female organs are. However, this ingénue hunk is a quick student and once he gets the important "lessons" he makes the leap to master and proceeds to virtually "show her heaven." Those were very hot and explicit scenes that would not shame any erotica writer!!!

There were parts in the book where I wanted to shout at her for behaving as she did in front of her impressionable kids without regard to anything, except the next "fix" she was going to get in the bedroom. In other parts I felt sorry for her that she had to give her lover up because she had to consider her kids and so many other people. She was torn and I could really feel her torment over this. I think her conflict was very well narrated and explained. Why shouldn't a grown self-sufficient woman choose to have a torrid sexual relationship with the man of her choice? On the other hand, why should her kids suffer because she was in thrall and addicted to her new young and very proficient lover?

The end was plausible and balanced, so I didn't feel disappointed. Also, as a longtime fan of the series "Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman", I enjoyed reading some of the backstage drama that went on between the lead actors. Maybe I could enjoy the book because it was so far removed from my life (unlike other reviewers who took this story way too personally.) I thought it was an excellent book and I will definitely check Davidson's other books.

Congratulations Sara!!! You've written the absolute, hands-down WORST book I've ever read!!
I don't understand how a book like this could ever get published. Much less obtain any praise from anyone!! The positive reviews must have been from the author and her friends.
This book is badly written, pointless, unfocused, and most of all is drop dead boring. I'm just grateful that I only paid 99 cents for it in a used bookstore and the author got nothing from the sale!!!! I fed it to the shredder since it doesn't deserve a place on my book shelf. Seriously!

My shrink says I should date worldly men since I'm a complex creature. But I've always loved "cowboy" types and this book explains why;....When a girl's had a bad day, a cowboy will just wrap his arms around her 'n make her feel safe.....A CEO doesn't want to hear about it, he's got problems of his own...... but he'll gladly pay for her shrink.
I LOVED this book, Sara. It was magical. And knowing.

I didn't know what this book really was about when I picked - but it was the perfect vacation reading for a 40 something woman.

I would not have believed that a book could so completely change my life but this one has. I found it in my local library --just stood frontways on ,under the Travel section !---the only book thus displayed and I just had to read it.
Well I read it in two evenings and then I read it again . Ive now decided I have to buy it. I wish the author would right a sequel .
Why did it change my life? I had had an affair with ,and then married ,a farmer who was younger than me and not the type of guy I would normally be with for many reasons and this book reaffirmed that Love can cross all barriers if we let it and are not afraid . I was nearly letting us drift apart by seeing only our differences. This book made me see my relationship with different eyes and be thankful for the rich and beautiful life I have.
The author is a very honest open woman with a wonderful style . I reccommend you read it with an open heart and mind.

I've read all of the Nevada Barr mysteries and this by far is the worst. Jumping back and forth between the two stories was tiring and boring. I only made it halfway through, and I had to struggle to get that far. The rest of the books in the series are good, but I don't recommend this one for a first time reader of the series.

I enjoyed the book. My husband likes to listen to audio books on our way cross-country.

Flashback (Nevada Barr): Our favorite national park ranger, Anna Pigeon, is temporarily filling in for the boss at Dry Tortugas National Park in the Florida Keys, after the park's head ranger lost his girlfriend, along with his grip on sanity. It is very hot, and not horribly exciting in the park until Anna receives a box of old letters from her sister, who had unearthed them because they were written by their great, great aunt Raffia when her husband was an army captain at Fort Jefferson in the Dry Tortugas. Anna spends her days dealing with sunburned tourists, and her nights getting caught up in the history of the last days of the Civil War.

Two stories then unfold; one in the present involving Anna and the staff at the park, and Raffia's story from the time when Fort Jefferson was an active military station and jail for the conspirators in the Lincoln assassination plot. The time periods start to merge in Anna's mind, however, when she sees and hears people from the past late at night while she wanders through the fort. Anna thinks she may be losing her grip on sanity, which makes her suspicious, since the last person to hold her job was institutionalized for the same thing. When one of her rangers is injured when an explosion sinks his boat, Anna starts to tie all the strange clues together to uncover a nefarious plot. Meanwhile, she's reading about a nefarious plot of old in her Aunt Raffia's letters, involving a sadistic sergeant, a rebel soldier, and Raffia's 16-year-old sister Tilly.

Anna is a solitary person and spends much of her time in introspection. Because of her circumstances at the fort, Raffia is also fairly solitary, but it was obvious that the two main characters in this novel were living very different lives. Raffia's welfare is largely dependent on the men around her, whereas Anna completely takes care of herself, even refusing her boyfriend's offer to fly down to keep her company when things are at their worst. Both stories, though different in nature, had similarities, and it was fun to read about two bits of intrigue happening in the same place at different times, and for different reasons. Nevada Barr is always worth reading, and this book is no exception.

The technique of telling two stories in alternate chapters did not work.Neither story ever got off the ground and the endings were dull!We are Nevada Barr fans,but finishing this book was a chore rather than a pleasure.Sorry!

Paul Davidson, former priest and sheriff in Natchez has proposed marriage and Anna Pigeon isn't sure this is what she wants. To put a little space between her and a long-term relationship she accepts a temporary assignment at Dry Tortugas National Park. An island, anything but conducive to contemplation as she finds herself involved in three different mysteries.
To keep the plot elements separate and moving Nevada Barr executes a splendid juggling act. Molly, Anna's sister send her a packet of letters written by a great-great-aunt who had lived at the fort during it's days as a prison. Rich in historical detail, a clever blend of the past and present, plus Anna's dilemma will insure fans follow the trail to a surprising conclusion. Maybe it is the complexity or diverse elements, but somewhere something is lacking, FLASHBACK isn't up to par for a Barr.
Nash Black, author of WRITING AS A SMALL BUSINESS and SINS OF THE FATHERS.

Hunting Season is the second novel I read featuring Anna Pigeon (the first was Track of the Cat). This series, by Nevada Barr, probably has 10 or so books in it now. I was curious whether 1) Barr is still successful with the Anna Pigeon model, and 2) whether you had to have read the previous 9 (or so) novels to enjoy this one.

In Hunting Season, Law Enforcement Ranger Anna Pigeon is in Mississippi, protecting a sliver of National Park Service Land, the Natchez Trace Parkway (never heard of it). She discovers a murder... or is it? As in Track of the Cat, Anna does her normal job while tracking down the human and forensic clues in this case. And as in Track of the Cat, she works with some interesting folk, is still getting over the loss of her husband, and doesn't mind getting dirty. It looks like she has stopped drinking, at least as much as she used to.

I had figured out the cause of death of Doyce about mid-way through the book. But I really missed the boat when it came to "whodunit."

I'll tell you, the pace, action, and employment focus of this series just keeps reminding me of Dick Francis and his mysteries relating to horse racing. Not bad company to be in!

I look forward to my next Anna Pigeon novel.

This was the MOST frustrating Anna Pigeon book I've ever read.

Anna was so incompetent I could have screamed at her over and over, had she been in my living room.
To let Randy Thigpen (among very many others) get away with such insubordination and ineptitude, did not a great boss make!!

And let's not even talk about the deer meat in the trunk!

This book was a DRUDGE to work through...

Like "Deep South," "Hunting Season" is set in Natchez Trace National Parkway. This is one of those units of the National Park system that nobody ever thinks of, but it takes up a 450-mile stretch from southwestern border of Mississippi through the northeastern border and up to Nashville. Because it's a strip of parkway, it is far more a part of the community than many other national parks.

Though she has been there a while now, and is deep in a relationship with a local pastor-sheriff, Anna remains an outsider to this community. She is a Yankee law enforcement officer who finds herself in a world Yankee stereotypes: good old boys, racists, pickup trucks and football. The facts that Nevada Barr loves the region and that Anna is falling in love with a sympathetic local smoothen the rough edges of this relationship between character and place.

As a supervisor, Anna continues to have to deal with some difficult employees. One of her two rangers is a real nightmare, a lazy, sexist, hostile, lawsuit-prone loser. His forms of resistance are so well drawn that they must be based on some people in Nevada Barr's own past as a ranger.

What about the mystery? It's less compelling than most others in the series. In addition, the book has an unfortunate title - - as you may find yourself halfway through the book wondering why it has this name. If you think too hard about this, you'll be in the rare situation of a mystery reader knowing more than the detective knows.

If you're new to the Anna Pigeon series, I'd read a different book first. If you're committed to the series, don't skip this one because there are personal developments that remain important for subsequent books.

I think you either like Anna or you don't. I can't say the plots are air tight. I can't say she's the most intuitive of detectives. I can say she's wonderful to spend time with -- and her insights and descriptions of very real people are, to use a well-worn word, palpable. She's focused, flawed, and fabulous (as a result). This plot is solid, the setting is well used, and the resolution is right there. Maybe not my favorite Nevada Barr, but still an enjoyable ride.

Anna Pigeon has parked her vehicle for a second time on the dark, gloomy Natchez Trace, which allows Nevada Barr time to strengthen characters and develop the atmosphere of setting. HUNTING SEASON treats readers to a return engagement of characters from DEEP SOUTH and allows you to sink deeper into the quagmire of place, local politics and "old friends."
HUNTING SEASON has all of the Barr standards, fast paced, extensive knowledge of park rangers, their problems and duties, great plotting and rapid pace.
You don't become bored with a Nevada Barr, Anna Pigeon novel, no matter where the location.
Nash Black, author of WRITING AS A SMALL BUSINESS and SINS OF THE FATHERS.