Name: Back of Beyond
ISBN: 9780312366124

C.J. Box

Struggling through early sobriety when his AA sponsor is murdered, police officer Cody Hoyt follows clues that point to a Yellowstone National Park guide who is leading Hoyt's son and other tourists into the wilderness.

Back of Beyond

Struggling through early sobriety when his AA sponsor is murdered, police officer Cody Hoyt follows clues to a Yellowstone National Park guide who is leading Hoyt's son and other tourists into the wilderness. By the Edgar Award and Anthony Award author of the Joe Pickett series. 100,000 first printing.

Denaiir

I would rate this as 2.5, with an avaerage narration (also 2.5-star) by Holter Graham. 

This is the first of the Highway Quartet Series and I had just recently read the 3rd book narrated by January LaVoy, who had done an excellent job, so I was looking forward to that one. Now that I've read 2, I think C.J. Box might just not be for me. Book 3's plot was really nothing special but was saved by narration and by the detective. I thought maybe with a different plot I would enjoy it more. However, it seems that Box has a tendency to use crazy coincidences all over the place, the plots focus on drug cartels (which I personally don't care for) and the detective in this one didn't really agree with me. 

Based on many reviews I think maybe I should check the Joe Pickett series, but I'm not sure I would be more involved, especially if Box continues to use those crazy coincidences to make his plots work.

Descriptions of life in the wilderness of Yellowstone appealed to me greatly and I should have been amazed, but unfortunately the plot ruined the atmosphere. 

Overall an ok read that could have be great if the plot had been less of a spaghetti western.

Fraser Simons

Started this because I’ve been watching Big Sky, which is based on this series, apparently. The show has been a really pleasant surprise. It’s way more inclusive than I expected and had some really fun twists. The show starts off at book 2 of this, so this is a prequel, I figured - only not really because two characters were in this book. I guess that means the show may remix the books into its own thing, kind of like The Magicians. I LOVE when shows do this instead of retreading everything exactly, but I’ll see when I start book 2 how much that holds. 

Anyway, in terms of the book:
Met my expectations. A couple fun twists. Good narration. Serviceable prose, but still felt a bit like commercial fiction. Nothing wrong with that but I’m definitely a reader that gets a lot out of theme and prose, so it’s fairly hard for commercial fiction to hit my sweet spot. 3 stars, for me, is exactly what you’d expect out of a book, so everything worked for me, I found it a fast read and satisfying enough. It would have been more interesting if the plotting foreshadowed one particular twist better. There’s a few contrivances that feel like an effort to do so, but don’t quite land. But I plan on starting the second all the same.

Back of Beyond

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