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311th out of 1,712 books
—
653 voters
The Dark Horse (Walt Longmire #5)
Read Craig Johnson's posts on the Penguin Blog.
Walt Longmire goes undercover to save a woman in an unfriendly place
Interweaving classic noir sensibilities and humor with contemporary themes of social justice, Craig Johnson's popular Walt Longmire mysteries transport readers to the sparse and rugged landscape of Wyoming. In The Dark Horse, the sheriff investigates when his...more
Walt Longmire goes undercover to save a woman in an unfriendly place
Interweaving classic noir sensibilities and humor with contemporary themes of social justice, Craig Johnson's popular Walt Longmire mysteries transport readers to the sparse and rugged landscape of Wyoming. In The Dark Horse, the sheriff investigates when his...more
Hardcover, 318 pages
Published
May 28th 2009
by Viking Adult
(first published 2009)
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Book Number Five in the Walt Longmire series by Craig Johnson. Walt is working undercover in a neighboring county, seeking evidence that a murder suspect currently housed in his jail is not guilty of the murder to which she has confessed.
The story is told in alternating chapters with the first chapter being set in the present, and the next set several days ago when Walt first became involved with the case. The chapters continue to alternate with the "present" advancing in time as the investigat...more
The story is told in alternating chapters with the first chapter being set in the present, and the next set several days ago when Walt first became involved with the case. The chapters continue to alternate with the "present" advancing in time as the investigat...more
Fifth in the Walt Longmire mystery series about a Wyoming sheriff and his own sense of justice.
This story was a Publishers Weekly Best Book of the Year in 2010 as well as aDilys Award nominee.
My Take
This one was a pip. Sure, it's your typical mystery in that the good guy is investigating a murder. It's not so typical for a Walt Longmire as he's hunting around, undercover, in another man's jurisdiction, without much backup.
The flashbacks were odd---be sure to read the chapter starts as Johnson fl...more
This story was a Publishers Weekly Best Book of the Year in 2010 as well as aDilys Award nominee.
My Take
This one was a pip. Sure, it's your typical mystery in that the good guy is investigating a murder. It's not so typical for a Walt Longmire as he's hunting around, undercover, in another man's jurisdiction, without much backup.
The flashbacks were odd---be sure to read the chapter starts as Johnson fl...more
I do not know if mildly depressed Wyoming Sheriff’s and Northern Cheyenne Indian’s are usually this funny, but I look forward to each book in the Walt Longmire series for this sole purpose. I am not going to say that Walt Longmire has a death wish, but that man sure can find himself in questionable situations. Who else in their right might would try to go undercover in a town of forty people and not think that there might possibly be a chance of being shot at? Yeah, that should tell you a little...more
The Dark Horse is the third (there are five) mystery I have read by Craig Johnson featuring Absaroka County, Wyoming Sheriff Walt Longmire. In this outing Longmire is trying to prove the innocence of a woman who confessed to murdering her husband after he burned down a barn with her horses inside. To do so he goes undercover as an insurance agent in a neighboring county where the crime took place. On the personal front Longmire is up for reelection and struggling with his attraction to a female...more
#5 Walt Longmire mystery set in Wyoming. The elections are coming up and Sheriff Longmire is avoiding thinking about it, and things are a bit slow in Absaroka County. Walt's daughter Cady has returned to her home in Philadelphia and he's at loose ends. The Sheriff of a neighboring county sends him a puzzle to chew on and a prisoner to house since their jail is overflowing and Walt eagerly jumps into it. Mary Barsad has confessed to shooting her husband Wade six times in the head after he set the...more
The Dark Horse, by Craig Johnson, B. Narrated by George Guidall, produced by Recorded Books, downloaded from audible.com.
This is the fifth in the Sheriff Walt Longmire series about a Wyoming sheriff. I actually found this book disappointing. First of all, any book that doesn’t have much of Henry in it in this series is disappointing to me. In this book, Sheriff Longmire is asked to hold a female prisoner for another county which doesn’t have room. She is accused of murdering her husband by shoot...more
This is the fifth in the Sheriff Walt Longmire series about a Wyoming sheriff. I actually found this book disappointing. First of all, any book that doesn’t have much of Henry in it in this series is disappointing to me. In this book, Sheriff Longmire is asked to hold a female prisoner for another county which doesn’t have room. She is accused of murdering her husband by shoot...more
1 like · like · see review
First Sentence: It was the third week of a high-plains October, and an unseasonably extended summer had baked the color from the landscape and had turned the rusted girders of the old bridge a thinned-out, tired brown.
Mary Barsad is accused of having shot her husband six times in the head and burning down their house, with his body in it, after he allegedly burnt down the barn with her beloved horses locked inside.
Not everyone believes Mary is guilty. Sheriff Walt Longmire has gone undercover t...more
Mary Barsad is accused of having shot her husband six times in the head and burning down their house, with his body in it, after he allegedly burnt down the barn with her beloved horses locked inside.
Not everyone believes Mary is guilty. Sheriff Walt Longmire has gone undercover t...more
I listened to the unabridged audio book version of this.
This was just a great book. I have nothing but good things to say about this story. The Dark Horse is an excellent example of what a character driven story line should be. Craig Johnson created an interesting, likeable, and somewhat sarcastic main character in Walt Longmire. What guy didn't want to be the cowboy type when he was a child?
Between the strong but simplistic plot, the great supporting characters like Henry Standing Bear and Dog...more
This was just a great book. I have nothing but good things to say about this story. The Dark Horse is an excellent example of what a character driven story line should be. Craig Johnson created an interesting, likeable, and somewhat sarcastic main character in Walt Longmire. What guy didn't want to be the cowboy type when he was a child?
Between the strong but simplistic plot, the great supporting characters like Henry Standing Bear and Dog...more
Update:
This is where we look at Walt's life as if in a great Western. Walt reconnects with his past and connects with a huge, black beast: tortured, chained in place and left alone to die in the middle of the great plains, far away from civilization, in the snow, and wounded beyond belief:
It was then that I saw something at the far edge of the circle. It was something dark and big, and it was rapidly moving my way. I thought it was the owl again, even thought it was the wrong color and didn't se...more
3 likes · like · see review
Kind of hard for a 6'5" guy to go undercover in a dried up town of 40, seemingly mostly heartless, citizens. But Walt gives it a go, because his soul tells him the prisoner in his jail is innocent. No matter that she's plead guilty. No matter all the evidence to the contrary.
I blew through all the Jack Reacher books, and overall enjoyed them, despite some issues. Now I've stumbled on Walt Longmire, and have decided he's all the good of Reacher with absolutely none of the bad. Walt has a soul, b...more
I blew through all the Jack Reacher books, and overall enjoyed them, despite some issues. Now I've stumbled on Walt Longmire, and have decided he's all the good of Reacher with absolutely none of the bad. Walt has a soul, b...more
I confess ... I read (or in this case, listen to George Guidall reads it to me on audio) Craig Johnson's Walt Longmire series because of the characters. The author has made me care about what happens to Walt, to Vic "The Terror" Moretti, to Henry Standing Bear, to Dog, ... And I read them for the setting, small-town Wyoming - which, in the case of that state, means REALLY small town. Then, and only then, does "plot" start kicking into the equation.
The Dark Horse, #5 in the ongoing series upon wh...more
The Dark Horse, #5 in the ongoing series upon wh...more
This is the fifth book in Craig Johnson's terrific Walt Longmire mystery series, in which each successive book seems even better than the last. In this one, a woman has confessed to murdering her husband, and Sheriff Walt, who doesn't believe she did it, goes undercover as an insurance agent in his quest to prove her innocence.
It's a well-told, well-plotted story, with a vivid depiction of both the beautiful, wide-open Wyoming landscape and the unwelcoming, unfriendly small town of Absalom, plen...more
It's a well-told, well-plotted story, with a vivid depiction of both the beautiful, wide-open Wyoming landscape and the unwelcoming, unfriendly small town of Absalom, plen...more
I am almost beyond words to describe how much I love this series. Walt and his world are just sheer joy to visit. In anticipation for the release of this book I re-listened to the previous four books. I think The Cold Dish is still my favorite but each book has something that makes it special and worth rereading (or re-listening).
In The Dark Horse Walt is trying to prove that the woman in his jail is not the killer she has confessed to being. The trail takes him back to the Powder River to a sm...more
In The Dark Horse Walt is trying to prove that the woman in his jail is not the killer she has confessed to being. The trail takes him back to the Powder River to a sm...more
Craig Johnson's crime novels about Sherif Walt Longmire are terrifically written in crisp prose full of observation, wisdom and insight. The Wyoming setting is central to the story, as usual, not only as a stage for the action but also as a psychological backdrop. In this novel, Longmire is a bit more removed than usual from his strong and engaging cast of supporting characters. Of course, this means he has to give new characters somewhat larger roles than usual, and so we get to know an old cow...more
Oct 05, 2009
Michael
rated it
4 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
Fans of western mysteries, Larry McMurtry fans.
Recommended to Michael by:
"Deadly Pleasures" review
4 1/2 star review. In the fifth book with Walt Longmire as the protagonist, Walt is asked to house Mary Barsad in his jail to await her trial. She confessed to killing her husband Wade, after he set fire to the family barn with her horses inside.
This wonderful tale reminds me of the TV shows of the past. At one point Walt is challanged to a fight in the town saloon, by an intoxicated moose of a man. I can picture this happening in an episode of Gunsmoke and Marshall Dillon disposing of the drun...more
This wonderful tale reminds me of the TV shows of the past. At one point Walt is challanged to a fight in the town saloon, by an intoxicated moose of a man. I can picture this happening in an episode of Gunsmoke and Marshall Dillon disposing of the drun...more
Ok, so this is another in the series (#5) of the sheriff from Wyoming, Walt Longmire. I haven't listened to them in order and that doesn't seem to matter at all. Somehow Craig Johnson was able to make this novel as entertaining as all the rest.
We listened to this as we were on a two day drive to visit family. The reader, George Guidall, does such a great job with the character voices and interpretation of the drama. My husband agrees. Besides being a good detective, Walt Longmire is the type of...more
We listened to this as we were on a two day drive to visit family. The reader, George Guidall, does such a great job with the character voices and interpretation of the drama. My husband agrees. Besides being a good detective, Walt Longmire is the type of...more
I am continually amazed at how marvelous this series is -- if not for the television series, I might never have encountered these marvelous characters I have now come to love, and what a shame that would be. This novel, the fifth outing in the Walt Longmire series, takes Walt "undercover" in a town of about 40, where he grew up, to investigate a murder in which all the parts just don't add up for Walt. Walt is, at his core, a deeply decent man with a strong sense of right and wrong and a desire...more
Dec 19, 2012
Cody Wysocki
added it
11/28/12
I just finished my other book it didn't take as long to read but still took a long time to read but i got it done. Now I have just started this book another book by Craig Johnson he is a good author and writes good books i think the book i am reading now is called The Dark Horse and i am only 20 some odd pages in to it and it is ok so far i really cant say to much yet because i am not far enough in to the book to know what is going on in there yet. Hopefully it is another good book that...more
I just finished my other book it didn't take as long to read but still took a long time to read but i got it done. Now I have just started this book another book by Craig Johnson he is a good author and writes good books i think the book i am reading now is called The Dark Horse and i am only 20 some odd pages in to it and it is ok so far i really cant say to much yet because i am not far enough in to the book to know what is going on in there yet. Hopefully it is another good book that...more
This was a most delightful listen between Craig Johnson's mellow prose and George Guidall's narration. It's the story of an aging Wyoming sheriff named Walt Longmire in present day who tries to solve the murder of a sociopathic lowlife. His wife has been accused of the murder and is of no help, since it was done after her barn was set on fire with seven purebred horses locked inside. She's too traumatized to talk. The sheriff laconically goes about his business with a dry understated wit that ha...more
1 like · like · see review
Walt Longmire, the main character of Craig Johnson's THE DARK HORSE, is very much a native of the Wyoming environs where he serves as a county Sheriff but at the same time, it is gradually revealed at a Wyoming pace that he is emerging from a place of pain and isolation. Also emerging is that the sources of his strength are also the fountainheads of his pain--family, the land and his job. The book creates a beautiful sense of place..even now a couple weeks after finishing the book I can still s...more
Another great read from Craig Johnson, and in this, his fifth in the series, he's added some new elements to the seemingly simple although in reality, extremely complicated, psychy of Sheriff Walter Longmire. My personal favorite of all the characters of the series is Henry Standing Bear, a.k.a. the "Cheyenne Nation". Although this time his role seemed somewhat diminished, perhaps due to several new character's being introduced. I think that I enjoy Walt & Henry's special relationship so muc...more
Starting in the middle of a series is probably never a great idea. You miss all the character development of the first books. I liked the setting (desolate town in Wyoming), I liked the characters (though without knowing Walt's previous relationship with her, some of Vic's actions seemed out of the blue), and I liked the mix of Western traditions and Mystery elements. It was an interesting and different read for me. I would recommend it to fans of Westerns, male readers looking for action books...more
Oct 30, 2012
Jennifer
rated it
4 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
other Craig Johnson fans
Recommended to Jennifer by:
the Cheyenne Nation
Shelves:
read-2012
In this latest novel by Craig Johnson, Walt Longmire goes undercover as an insurance adjustor in another Wyoming county to investigate the death of Wade Barsard. After killing his wife's horses, Wade is shot six times by his wife and his house is set on fire. His wife, Mary, even remembers firing the shots. However, Walt isn't so sure this open and shut case is so "shut" and this leads to the above mentioned "undercover." I wish that the TV show Longmire hadn't used part of this plot in season 1...more
The Dark Horse is the 5th in the Craig Johnson mystery series about Wyoming Sheriff Walt Longmire. I read the first book, The Cold Dish, and liked it, so when I could get the audiobook version of The Dark Horse at a sale price, I jumped on it. The story stands on its own with a good plot and mystery, but I think I might have enjoyed it more had I read the intervening stories, because it seemed that the core group of characters have been through some life events that I missed reading about.
There...more
There...more
Let me just state a few facts up front:
1. I haven’t read any of the other books in this series
2. I don’t like Western stories
3. I have absolutely nothing in common with any of the characters, so relating to them was pretty much a no go
And yet, I thought this was a good read. It was a bit slow going at first, but there is a charm to Walt Longmire’s subdued sense of humor that is refreshing. Despite the general plot being a bit tired and worn out, I enjoyed being along on the adventure for the opp...more
1. I haven’t read any of the other books in this series
2. I don’t like Western stories
3. I have absolutely nothing in common with any of the characters, so relating to them was pretty much a no go
And yet, I thought this was a good read. It was a bit slow going at first, but there is a charm to Walt Longmire’s subdued sense of humor that is refreshing. Despite the general plot being a bit tired and worn out, I enjoyed being along on the adventure for the opp...more
Another enjoyable Wyoming mystery starring Walt Longmire--in this one he tries to prove that a woman accused of murdering her husband is innocent. I enjoy these despite the swearing deputy.
"Kind of like the tree that falls in the forest when nobody's around? I mean, if nobody remembers the history, did it still happen?" (131)
It is a western tradition that the passenger always gets the gate, which is why cowboys generally fight to sit in the middle, where you have no responsibilities other than t...more
"Kind of like the tree that falls in the forest when nobody's around? I mean, if nobody remembers the history, did it still happen?" (131)
It is a western tradition that the passenger always gets the gate, which is why cowboys generally fight to sit in the middle, where you have no responsibilities other than t...more
Great story - we learn a bit more about the Sheriff and his upbringing. I have been watching the series on TV and this book was loosely represented in one of those episodes. Books are way, way better. This story focuses on a mob guy who was under witness protection and is supposedly killed by his wife. Nobody liked him and the fact that he burns up a bunch of horses doesn't endear him to anyone else. Longmire figures out the story and, while there were a few clues that I caught really early on,...more
The Dark Horse by Craig Johnson
Johnson’s “The Dark Horse” is another page turner in the Walt Longmire series. The story takes place in NE Wyoming in the Powder River Country. A local rancher is found dead and the barn full of his wife’s horses and the house have all burned. His wife Mary is sitting in the yard with her rifle across her lap crying and confessing that she shot him. Longmire, the sheriff of Absaroka County, goes undercover to the small town of Absalom. There he meets several charac...more
Johnson’s “The Dark Horse” is another page turner in the Walt Longmire series. The story takes place in NE Wyoming in the Powder River Country. A local rancher is found dead and the barn full of his wife’s horses and the house have all burned. His wife Mary is sitting in the yard with her rifle across her lap crying and confessing that she shot him. Longmire, the sheriff of Absaroka County, goes undercover to the small town of Absalom. There he meets several charac...more
Longmire has given me an understanding of how mystery readers get sucked into an author and end up reading their entire list. I feel somehow attached to this character and know that I will read the rest of entries even though I know I won't remember any of the actual "cases". I finished this one a week ago, and while I can cite what is going on at this stage with Longmire's life, I have already forgotten the case...something about a conman murdered in his sleep, supposedly by his wife. And yet,...more
Craig Johnson presents a Wyoming that is harsh, bitter, but beautiful. In this episode, Walt is investigating undercover the death of a horrible man who was shot 6 times in the head and left to sizzle in a burning house. His wife confesses to the crime, but Walt does not believe that she is guilty. The characters are portrayed as believable heroes and villains. I admire the many ways that Johnson uses to describe characters and setting. There are always comic moments, like the writing of Shakesp...more
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Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name.
American novelist and playwright. He lives in Ucross, near Sheridan, Wyoming, population 25.
Johnson has written eight novels. His Sheriff Walt Longmire novels include The Cold Dish, Death Without Company, Kindness Goes Unpunished, Another Man's Moccasins, Junkyard Dogs, The Dark Horse (which received starred re...more
More about Craig Johnson...
American novelist and playwright. He lives in Ucross, near Sheridan, Wyoming, population 25.
Johnson has written eight novels. His Sheriff Walt Longmire novels include The Cold Dish, Death Without Company, Kindness Goes Unpunished, Another Man's Moccasins, Junkyard Dogs, The Dark Horse (which received starred re...more
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Feb 21, 2013 12:57pm
Thanks for the correction - I just updated my review.
Feb 21, 2013 03:37pm