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Winterkill (Joe Pickett #3)

4.03 of 5 stars 4.03 · rating details · 1,773 ratings · 132 reviews

Joe Pickett's pursuit of a killer through the rugged mountains of Wyoming takes a horrifying turn when his beloved foster daughter is kidnapped. Now it's personal.

Paperback, 352 pages

Published June 29th 2004 by Berkley (first published May 5th 2003)

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Sep 13, 2011 Wesley rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: series_favorites

Well this if my favorite of the Joe Pickett books so far. I did the first 2 on the kindle but chose to do this one via audiobook on the Ipod as I was starting to have little faith in the series.

1. audiobook was a fantastic choice as this was just flat out awesomesauce, 2. what a great story (gotta like the woods though) 3. I can't wait for book 4.

This is a great one timer because the story unfolds and it's the kind suspenseful so once the cats outta the bag, ya know. I'd almost recommend skipp...more

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Apr 20, 2010 Joyce Lagow rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: mystery

3rd in the Joe Pickett series.[return][return]Joe Pickett, game warden in Wyoming's Bighorn Mountains, runs across what is a massacre of elk just as a storm is about to hit. The killer is Lamar Gardniner, a district supervisor for the National Forest,and a friend of Joe� s. In the process of taking Gardiner in, Lamar manages to get the best of Joe, handcuff him to the steering wheel of his truck, and escape. Our antihero Joe removes the wheel from the steering column and tracks Gardiner down� to...more

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May 11, 2013 Tom Tischler rated it 4 of 5 stars

A forest service supervisor is murdered right after he goes
on a shooting spree and slaughters a herd of elk. Warden Joe
Pickett is in the area and hears all of the shooting. He finds
the supervisor impaled to a tree with an arrow. A mysterious
stranger who trains falcons and carries an unusual weapon is
arrested for the slaying. Next a special investigative team
headed by a vindictive woman bent on a confrontation with a
group of government survivalists camped out on government land
arrives in town....more

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Apr 23, 2013 Cat Case rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: read-in-2013

This is actually the review for books one through three plus the short story "Dull Knife."

This series. Well, I am not sure what I think as a whole but the individual books are pretty solid. I like that Joe Pickett isn't right all the time or a badass warrior who has all of the answers. I like his family, and I do like that the family faces the consequences of Joe's (in)actions. The daughters are well developed for young characters, even though I think 7-yo Sheridan acted more like a girl twice h...more This is actually the review for books one through three plus the short story "Dull Knife."

This series. Well, I am not sure what I think as a whole but the individual books are pretty solid. I like that Joe Pickett isn't right all the time or a badass warrior who has all of the answers. I like his family, and I do like that the family faces the consequences of Joe's (in)actions. The daughters are well developed for young characters, even though I think 7-yo Sheridan acted more like a girl twice her age in the first book. I strangely dig Nate even though I am damned sure if he was a real person we'd probably never tolerate each other. But I think the real reason I keep reading is that Box does for Wyoming what Lehane did for Boston and Lippman does for Baltimore — he brings the state alive in a three-dimensional color that is always one of the stars of the books. So for all of Box's political agenda story lines and internal inconsistencies, I keep reading for Wyoming, and I think that's as good of a reason as any so far.

What bothers me, and frankly, I hope I don't see all that much longer is when Box integrates class and race issues into his story lines. It happened with Jeannie Keeley in Winterkill as her being described as Mississippi white trash, etc. and even when the story was from her point of view she was given very little depth and understanding. To say that I was surprised at how Box wrote Joe observing the laughter between April and Jeannie is an understatement; it showed an understanding from Box and Joe that has been absent previously. In the short story, "Dull Knife," Joe finds the body of reservation basketball legend Jessica Antelope and Joe spends much of the story lamenting Jessica's choices and how res life has kept her down. Okay, I don't know if Box has lived on a reservation, but I have lived on two for many years and res life is not all meth and beer. The choices of a few characters does not reflect on a whole community, for fuck's sake. This passage sums up the main problems I have with Joe and his moral compass:

Joe sighed and left the scene. He hated McLanahan’s casual racism. Worse, he hated the fact that in too many instances, McLanahan was right.

Joe sees that McLanahan is an asshole and a racist to boot, and Box illustrates this well but what Box fails to do with Joe is have his main character achieve any kind of consciousness of his own racism. Instead, Box writes Joe as the moral character who wants no part of the sheriff's racist stories and idioms but at the same time Joe is there playing the Great White Hope by underscoring that McLanahan is actually right about Indians, he just shouldn't be so crude about announcing it. GAH!!! It's maddening and so absolutely expected that I can't even be that angry about Box's position because I AM NOT AT ALL SURPRISED. *sigh* Further Joe positions himself as the good white man by book-ending with Heywood who is the white man who wants to be Native. Every Indian knows one of these characters and I will give Box the credit that he must know one or two as well because Heywood's characterization is right on point. But I still feel that Heywood and McLanahan exist, in this story at least, to prop up Joe as the "good white" who can tell it as "it really is" while still being a good guy. It doesn't work that way; Joe can't condemn McLananhan's racism and then prop it up, he can't be irate about Heywood's infantilization of the res and then try to parent Jessica Antelope from the outside.

Yeah, so I am continuing to read and I know what to expect from Box so I try not to get bent out of shape, but he's walking the line with me in that I can take so much but if it goes overboard, I'll pull out of the series.(less)

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May 08, 2012 Dlora rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: adventure-action, murder-mystery

This Box wilderness mystery was more uneven than his first two novels. The main character, Joe Pickett, seemed to be moving into some anger and pro-action traits that were more extreme than before, maybe driven by the fact that his foster daughter was taken out of their family and he gave up on the system to protect her. And the plot seemed like it was drifting along at first--it started with a bang (or whatever sound hunting arrows driving into a target make) with the death of a forest service...more

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May 09, 2009 Sherri rated it 4 of 5 stars

Wyoming game warden Joe Pickett stumbles into a third novel by C.J. Box in his town of Saddlestring, Wyoming.

A forest service supervisor is murdered right behind a crazy shooting spree that slaughtered a herd of elk. To solve this crime, and against Joe's wishes, a special investigative tem is sent and the head honcho is a calculating woman without a heart, devious, misleading, cold as ice. She is ready to create a war that need not be, with a group of survivalists who chose to camp out on fede...more

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Jul 23, 2012 Genine Franklin-Clark rated it 2 of 5 stars

Our Hero, the Game Warden, has as his enemies: (1) A crazy (literally) Fed woman who has a
hand-held cocker spaniel, (2) an FBI man, as crazy as the woman, and (3) the local sheriff, who has a bone to pick with Our Hero. These three plan to take down the killers of government employees
(although they're the killers only in the minds of the Evil Three.) The woman had a Yorkie which she got to keep her cocker spaniel company, but then decided she didn't like the Yorkie, and refused to let it into a...more

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Jan 29, 2013 Chris rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

3rd in the Joe Pickett series.[return][return]Joe Pickett, game warden in Wyoming's Bighorn Mountains, runs across what is a massacre of elk just as a storm is about to hit. The killer is Lamar Gardniner, a district supervisor for the National Forest,and a friend of Joe s. In the process of taking Gardiner in, Lamar manages to get the best of Joe, handcuff him to the steering wheel of his truck, and escape.
Our antihero Joe removes the wheel from the steering column and tracks Gardiner down to f...more

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Aug 27, 2012 Dorothy rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: modern-day-mysteries, western-mysteries

C.J. Box is a good story-teller. He keeps it simple - good guys vs. bad guys. The only reliably good guy in his stories is Game Warden Joe Pickett. Most everyone else is venal and indifferent to the lives of others.

The worst of the bad guys are always federal employees, usually those who work for the Bureau of Land Management, the Forest Service, and occasionally, as in this book, the F.B.I. Those who believe that individual rights are paramount and must never be infringed upon by a government...more C.J. Box is a good story-teller. He keeps it simple - good guys vs. bad guys. The only reliably good guy in his stories is Game Warden Joe Pickett. Most everyone else is venal and indifferent to the lives of others.

The worst of the bad guys are always federal employees, usually those who work for the Bureau of Land Management, the Forest Service, and occasionally, as in this book, the F.B.I. Those who believe that individual rights are paramount and must never be infringed upon by a government representing a larger society are always portrayed very sympathetically.

In this story, for example, we have a group of survivalists who have arrived in the Bighorn Mountains from all over the country and are camping on federal lands. Many of these people are refugees from the firestorms of Waco, Ruby Ridge, and the Montana Freemen. They hate the federal government.

When a local forest service supervisor is killed, suspicion falls in the direction of those who hate the government, but then a local recluse, a falconer who is also a renegade former Special Ops for the hated feds, is found to have the kind of bow and arrows that were used to kill the man and he is arrested for the crime.

Soon, though, another local federal employee is lured into an accident and left to die in a heavy snowstorm. He gets free and wanders onto the road where he is accidentally hit by Joe Pickett in his truck. Joe takes him to the hospital with serious injuries both from the earlier assault and from his collision with the truck.

The falconer who was arrested for the original murder uses his one phone call to contact Joe. He is convinced that Pickett is a man he can trust and he asks two favors of him - one to take care of his birds and, two, to find out who actually killed the forest service supervisor and free him from jail. Joe finds that he believes Nate the falconer's story and he sets out to fulfill his promises.

Meantime, a special federal investigative unit has arrived in town to look into the "murder and assaults" of federal employees. It is headed by an insanely evil woman who is assisted by a couple of psycho F.B.I. agents. You know right away that nothing good is going to come of this.

Joe also learns that the birth mother of his and wife MaryBeth's foster daughter April Keeley is with the survivalist group in the mountains. He and MaryBeth had been trying to adopt April who has lived with them for three years. Now they are afraid that the irresponsible mother who abandoned her in the first place will try to take her back.

All of these family concerns weigh on Joe Pickett's mind as he goes about trying to do his job and trying to bring justice in a place where it often seems that political concerns about what will advance the careers of local, state, and federal officials take precedence over everything.

Box's narrative is a real page-turner. At a certain point, I found that I just had to know how it all turned out and so I read straight through, even though there were other things that I needed to be doing. In the Pickett family, he creates characters that we care very much about and that we want to see happy, but we strongly suspect that that just isn't going to happen. This creates the tension that keeps us turning pages.

As a reader, although I enjoy the books in the series, I could wish that his portrayal of some characters - the federal employees, for example - was a bit more nuanced. My experience of federal employees is that generally they are members of the community who usually share the values of that community and are just doing their jobs to the best of their abilities. Narratives like Box's feed into the demonizing of these people which is, unfortunately, a popular blood sport in some segments of our society. I find it unworthy of a fine writer. (less)

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Oct 24, 2012 Frank rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: thrillers-mystery

The Joe Pickett series by Box is becoming one of my favorites along with the Longmire series by Craig Johnson. Both series take place in Wyoming and involve local ranchers, cowboys, hunters, etc. Joe Pickett is the local game warden and gets in the middle of some perplexing situations. In Winterkill, he stumbles upon a U.S. Forest Service supervisor who is wantonly killing a herd of Elk. The FS officer winds up dead and pinned to a tree by some high-powered arrows. In trying to solve the murder,...more

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Mar 28, 2013 Bart Simms rated it 4 of 5 stars

Winterkill is the third book in the Joe Pickett series. It is an exciting story, partly a mystery and partly a thriller in which it was not at all clear how it would turn out. Wyoming comes alive under Box's writing, and the weather is almost always a factor in what happens. The story rather accurately depicts the sort of situation when principled, antigovernment extremists confront government bureaucrats with more authority than good sense. The confrontation leads to a situation reminiscent of...more

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Mar 02, 2010 Patty rated it 4 of 5 stars

This is the third book in the Joe Pickett series and I'm still not sure if I can continue with the series. Don't get me wrong, I love Joe and his family, I like the writing style and the setting. I'm having a problem with the large body counts and *huge* things that keep cropping up. Secret societies that "run" the country, environmentalists that are dead (or are they) and the country wide conspiracies that surround them, and then having refuges from the biggest government fiasco's all show up i...more

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Oct 19, 2012 Chris rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: mystery-wyoming

So we meet the mysterious and formidable Nate Romanowski, falconer and former special ops soldier, in this book-- the third installment in the series. Joe has another embarrassing moment when an arrested poacher cuffs him to his steering wheel and escapes in a blizzard only to be mysteriously murdered. Nate is immediately arrested and asks Joe to clear him. Joe has never met Nate but believes in his innocence. OBTW the mother of April, now living with Joe and his daughters since she abandoned he...more

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Apr 21, 2009 Babette rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: mystery-suspense

I am discovering, having completed the third Joe Pickett mystery, that C.J.Box is skillfully developing his characters and their interconnections in a way that makes the stories more interesting and rich. I also enjoy his portrayal of a part of the U.S. that I have never visited. The way of life there seems very real, the concerns and problems of the citizens very different from those living in a big city.

I don't like to read books in a series one right after the other. I don't like to read book...more

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Apr 13, 2012 Deb rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2012-books-read, kindled-ebook

Joe Pickett is a good man, and he tries always to do the right thing. This character trait is acknowledged by many, including potential suspect Nate Romanowski, but it's a trait that gets him into trouble. In this installment, Joe and Marybeth are faced with the potential loss of their foster daughter April when April's biological mother rolls into town with a group of anti-government free-staters. Then a Forest Service is murdered in a bizarre chain of events. The Forest Service sends in loose...more

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Sep 26, 2011 Jerry rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2011

Warden Joe Pickett lives in Saddlestring, Wyoming, where he patrols the wilderness. It's winter and the snow is falling through much of the story. Joe is trying to do the right thing in a situation that was accurately summed up by his daughter Sheridan "It seemed like the good guys turned out to be the bad guys, and the bad guys weren't all that bad" That about sums it up. reads like the all too real headlines of the past. Ruby Ridge, Waco... I think Box got a lot of things right, but I don't t...more

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Aug 08, 2009 Arizonagirl rated it 2 of 5 stars

I found a website listing 'If you like Nevada Barr, then you'll like...' and CJ Box was one of the authors listed. However this story wasn't anything like the Anna Pigeon stories, except that the main character is a federal employee. Joe Pickett, the local game warden, is our protagonist who is trying to save his foster daughter from the Waco-like anti-government survivalist group and the corrupt government bureaucracy. The story was engaging enough, but I'm going to continue my search for other...more

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Apr 14, 2012 Anthony Bellaleigh rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.
The third Joe Pickett murder mystery continues much where Savage Run left off.

For me this was a two and a half star book. I've upped it to three stars in recognition of the author's continued ability to accelerate a story through its second half.

Summary - it gets cold in the Rockies, very cold. The only half-decent lawman in Twelve Sleep County remains game warden Joe Pickett but sadly his family can't survive two books without child-related adversity. Various new people drop in to either add mo...more

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Aug 29, 2011 Barbara rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: action-adventure, mystery

"A severe winter storm bears down on Joe Pickett's town of Saddlestring but another type of storm--purely a human creation--is in the works as a ragtag band of "Sovereigns" camp in a national forest, much to the consternation of local law enforcement. The book begins with the unlikely killing of Lamar Gardiner, whom Joe arrests after he kills several elk. His pursuit turns more personal when his foster daughter April is kidnapped by her white trash mother, Jeannie Keeley, who's involved with the...more

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Dec 31, 2012 Judy rated it 4 of 5 stars

I'm working my way through the Joe Pickett books (this is the 3rd in the series). I always enjoy stories about the west and Joe P is an easy person to relate to. He's a game warden and family man who inevitably discovers and solves crimes while out on patrol, much to the disgust of the local sheriff and deputy. He isn't particularly skilled at crime solving, can't even shoot accurately, but he's honest and persistent in fighting for what's right. Easy, light reading. Stephanie Plum western style...more

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Sep 30, 2008 Kari rated it 5 of 5 stars

I decided to go meet the author at a Thursday evening event at the Highlands Ranch Library in Douglas County, so I checked out Winterkill on Monday. I only had time to read about half of it before his presentation, but I was hooked. And when I met CJ Box, it was like he just stepped out of his own book - I could tell that he writes his characters and his plots out of what he knows and loves. Box lives in Cheyenne, and his mysteries are set in Wyoming.

Main character Joe Pickett is a game warden...more

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May 08, 2010 Betty410 rated it 3 of 5 stars

Between Ck.J. Box and Coel, Wyoming becomes familiar territory. Our hero, Joe Pickett, gets mixed up in more than one crimein this story and meets a new friend--a falconer and a loner who gets Joe out of a big jam. The major theme of this story is a group of anti-government people who move into a camp ground. One of the clan is the mother of the little girl that Joe and his wife, Marybeth, have taken in as a foster child and that mother wants April back.
I will read more from C.J. Box

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Sep 05, 2010 KarenC rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: amateur_sleuths, murder_mystery, better_than_tv

Enjoyable read. Pickett tries to sort things out before everything implodes. His persistence goes beyond his job as a game warden. A decent story, but you can see where it's going. Pickett and Wyoming well-portrayed, but other characters could use more fleshing out. Daughter Sheridan is the only one in the family who gets character. Joe's little errors in judgement and lack of confidence with his handgun (don't they require any practice?) made me think of Stephanie Plum. Is the Pickett series th...more

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Feb 10, 2012 Colleen rated it 4 of 5 stars

I read this book by mistake - thinking it was the community read book by Craig Leslie, also called WinterKill. But - I love this book. I recognized characters, identified, and was amazed by the turn of events in this mystery. Very much a mystery of the West with all its libertarian views and the conflict between ranchers, hunters, environmentalists and bureaucrats. I'd recommend this to my westy brethren. And, I'm going to get more in this series.

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Apr 25, 2011 Carolyn Rose rated it 3 of 5 stars

Set in a Wyoming winter, this book is aptly named. There's plenty of action, conflict, tension, and suspense, but this story not for the faint of heart and some of the acts of senseless brutality caused me to almost set it aside several times. Reacting to a story is subjective, and I felt a few of the characters crossed the stereotype line. And - this may be a gender thing - the ending left me feeling empty.

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Feb 13, 2012 Terri rated it 4 of 5 stars

I'm really liking this series by C.J. Box. This book, in particular, was great reading during a snowstorm and great listening while finishing a pair of socks. Again it is Game Warden Joe v. outsiders--this time leftover government personnel from Ruby Ridge and Waco and a survivalist group. Caught between the two groups, Joe must try to save his family, community, and way of life.

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Sep 28, 2009 Phair rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: mystery

Quite good although the reader of the audio version was not great. Box writes interesting characters and I liked the new one-Wade, the falconer guy. The fact that really bad things often DO happen to Joe Pickett makes this series more gut wrenching than some. Not particularly fond of the massive snows in the Wyoming wilderness- I am not a snow bunny- but they are well described.

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Mar 16, 2011 Doris rated it 4 of 5 stars

Game Warden Joe Pickett, the lead in this mystery series, embodies the best of our humanity as he struggles against the worst of it. He is a realistic and wonderfully likable "average joe" hero. C.J. Box writes in vivid detail (but does not over-write, so the plot unfolds well), and weaves a great mystery with very human drama that, in this book in particular, hits with almost unbearable force. Brilliant.

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Dec 31, 2010 Rae rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: mystery

I absolutely love this mystery series by Box. Joe Pickett continues to develop as a character and I love his compassion, love for family, work ethic and human frailties. It's nice to have crimes solved by someone who doesn't always do the right things in the smartest way. Box makes the good guys good and the bad guys really nasty. He's also created a few characters who are in-between. Great fun.

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Feb 03, 2009 Martin Streetman rated it 4 of 5 stars Recommends it for: dad

Recommended to Martin by: brett

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.

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About C.J. Box

Edgar Award-winning author C.J. Box is the author of eleven novels including the Joe Pickett series. He's also won the Anthony Award, Prix Calibre 38 (France), the Macavity Award, the Gumshoe Award, and the Barry Award. His short stories have been featured in America's Best Mystery Stories of 2006 and limited-edition printings. 2008 novel BLOOD TRAIL was nominated for the International IMPAC Dubli...more

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Winterkill (Joe Pickett #3)

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