Force of Nature

Force of Nature may be C. J. Box’s best book yet in the Joe Pickett series. Box presents the usual characters, but this story is mostly about Nate Romanowski, the former special forces guy, now a fugitive from the feds, who has dropped off the grid in the rugged Wyoming back country. The book is built around Nate’s unique world as a master falconer, the teacher of falconry to Sheridan Pickett, Joe’s oldest kid. Nate was trained by the more infamous and even more remote character, John Nemecek. Box lets us know that Nate knows some secrets about Nemecek’s past, and as the result of some new developments, Nemecek is unwilling to risk having those secrets come to light. To say he is ruthless would be a dramatic understatement.

The book opens with three people attempting to take down Nate. They catch him in the middle of a trout fishing stream, resulting in Nate being wounded, shot through the shoulder with an arrow, but the three of them are killed. The boat in which they were riding floats down stream to be discovered – thus begins the action that does not stop until the end of the book. Everyone who has a connection to Nate is at risk, and of course, that puts Joe and the rest of the Picketts directly in the middle. Nemecek is the one character that makes Nate afraid, and throughout the book, Nate assumes that he won’t survive his efforts to protect the Picketts. Box brings in the usual peripheral characters: Joe’s remarkable wife Marybeth and the boob Sheriff McLanahan. McLanahan is up for re-election and Joe is openly supporting his opponent, the competent Deputy Mike Reed. However, McLanahan and Pickett need to cooperate with each other to solve the murders that keep piling up, and cooperation is not easy for either of them. Box also introduces numerous new people including Joe’s new trainee, Luke Brueggemann and Haley (never caught her last name). Haley is a particularly interesting character whose role is fluid and helps keep the intensity of this book rolling along.

In teaching us about falconry, Box talked about the devotion and dedication it takes for a human to develop a partnership with a bird which might just fly away at any moment and never return. He also wrote of the intensity of the falcon, like that of Romanowski and Nemecek: “There’s this condition elite falcons get when all they think about is to fly, fuck, and fight. It’s called  yarak.” (I laughed at that line – a variant of the old joke about the “Rule of the 3 F’s” – but that’s another story for a different format.) This is a very good book – a very fast read. You won’t want to put it down.