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Anna Pigeon #6
Blind Descent
A would-be killer is drawing Anna Pigeon deep into the darkness-and closer to hell than she's ever gone before. "Anna Pigeon, the intrepid National Park Service ranger in Nevada Barr's superb wilderness mysteries, has had some perilous experiences in the five novels that preceded Blind Descent, but none compares with this thrilling subterranean adventure in the underground caverns of Lechuguilla, 'a monster man-eating cave' in New Mexico's Carlsbad Caverns. When a fellow ranger is injured in a caving accident, Anna chokes back the willies of claustrophobia and joins the rescue team. Burrowing 800 feet below ground, she negotiates airless tunnells, gaping pits, vaulting caverns and silently flowing rivers, each hazard with a daunting name like Razor Blade Run or the Wormhole. At the end of the dangerous descent, she reaches her friend and hears her say, 'It wasn't an accident.' A would-be killer is drawing Anna Pigeon deep into the darkness-and closer to hell than she's ever gone before.
372 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published January 1, 1998
392 people are currently reading
2215 people want to read
About the author
Nevada Barr
66 books2,292 followersNevada Barr is a mystery fiction author, known for her "Anna Pigeon" series of mysteries, set in National Parks in the United States. Barr has won an Agatha Award for best first novel for Track of the Cat.
Barr was named after the state of her birth. She grew up in Johnstonville, California. She finished college at the University of California, Irvine. Originally, Barr started to pursue a career in theatre, but decided to be a park ranger. In 1984 she published her first novel, Bittersweet, a bleak lesbian historical novel set in the days of the Western frontier.
While working in Guadalupe Mountains National Park, Barr created the Anna Pigeon series. Pigeon is a law enforcement officer with the United States National Park Service. Each book in the series takes place in a different National Park, where Pigeon solves a murder mystery, often related to natural resource issues. She is a satirical, witty woman whose icy exterior is broken down in each book by a hunky male to whom she is attracted (such as Rogelio).
Currently, Ms. Barr lives in New Orleans, LA.
http://us.macmillan.com/author/nevada...
Barr was named after the state of her birth. She grew up in Johnstonville, California. She finished college at the University of California, Irvine. Originally, Barr started to pursue a career in theatre, but decided to be a park ranger. In 1984 she published her first novel, Bittersweet, a bleak lesbian historical novel set in the days of the Western frontier.
While working in Guadalupe Mountains National Park, Barr created the Anna Pigeon series. Pigeon is a law enforcement officer with the United States National Park Service. Each book in the series takes place in a different National Park, where Pigeon solves a murder mystery, often related to natural resource issues. She is a satirical, witty woman whose icy exterior is broken down in each book by a hunky male to whom she is attracted (such as Rogelio).
Currently, Ms. Barr lives in New Orleans, LA.
http://us.macmillan.com/author/nevada...
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 725 reviews
April 28, 2024
Park ranger Anna Pigeon is assigned to go down into Lechugilla Caverns in Carlsbad National Park, New Mexico, to rescue a fellow ranger who has gotten trapped. But when events turn tragic, Anna begins to suspect that a simple accident may not have been so simple after all. And solving a crime becomes much more complex trapped underground with someone who may be willing to kill again. This one had lots of angles… troubled marriages and former lovers… shady business practices… park politics. There were so many possible suspects, I was left guessing up until the end. 5/5 stars.
Content Warning: I was warned before reading this one that if you are claustrophobic, this is a ROUGH book to read. I am not particularly claustrophobic, but in places, this made me shiver. Author Nevada Barr has a real talent for vivid, visceral descriptions and bringing her settings to life, which is what I LOVE about her books. I feel like with each book in the series, I am visiting each National Park Anna is assigned to. But in this one, be prepared, you’re definitely trapped in a cave!
Content Warning: I was warned before reading this one that if you are claustrophobic, this is a ROUGH book to read. I am not particularly claustrophobic, but in places, this made me shiver. Author Nevada Barr has a real talent for vivid, visceral descriptions and bringing her settings to life, which is what I LOVE about her books. I feel like with each book in the series, I am visiting each National Park Anna is assigned to. But in this one, be prepared, you’re definitely trapped in a cave!
April 12, 2010
So as someone who is claustrophobic, I found this book utterly terrifying since the majority of the book consisted of various caving expeditions deep underground. The author's descriptions were amazing though, and really made the cave come to life, and i could almost feel like i was there scrambling through the mud, walking through the aragonite crystal forest, or wriggling through the wormhole-like tunnels. As the caving expedition started in the book, I began thinking that perhaps caving was something that Jeff and I would really enjoy and that I should just swallow my fears and buckle down and try it...as the story progressed though, i realized that I would undoubtedly be much happier with my feet always above the ground. However, I think I might like to try the more commercialized and "domesticated" Carlsbad Caverns (that part sounded perfectly safe - no caving gear required, there's even an elevator!) Perhaps we'll make it out there to try it sometime. Anyway, long story short, the book was really good: great setting, great plot, great characters, great twist at the end, and as usual excellent descriptions of the park and its "resources." My only complaint is that, once again, the book seems to end very abruptly. The conclusion after the story's climax takes only a page, so it feels strange. You're really engrossed in the story, and stuff is happening bam bam bam, then its all over, and she wraps everything up in a paragraph or two. It be nice to ease out of the story a bit more slowly. This way, the reader feels abit as though she is left hanging, and saying "that's all? where's the rest?"
November 26, 2017
Finished this a while ago but forgot to review. If I reviewed at the the time, this probably would've gotten 3.5 stars, rounding up to 4. But with time and reflection, I'm rounding down to 3.
This is the first Nevada Barr book I've read, and I've only been meaning to read it for 8 years. she writes murder mysteries set at different national parks,and this one happens to be set at my park! So ever since I started working at Carlsbad, visitors have been asking if I've read this.
I finally got it from the library, and it was a very quick read. It's a page turner and I was curious how the mystery would be solved. The descriptions of the park were great, if tainted slightly by the main character's claustrophobia. The villain wasn't obvious but there were some clues. Even though bad things happened in a cave, they weren't because of the cave being dangerous, they were because people are dangerous. So I was happy that Barr didn't lend to the myth that caves are unstable, crumbling, deadly places.
However, two things bugged. One minor, one major. Who hiked out of the cave in the first place to get help? Why were they never a suspect? everyone else who remained in the cave was an automatic suspect. Meanwhile, this person was never mentioned again.
And the major issue: entrance control. In cave rescues, there is ALWAYS someone as entrance control who records everyone and everything that goes in and comes out. I can't rant too much about this without giving away a major plot point, but this annoyed me to no end. I ended up deciding the anonymous entrance control person (because there's no way there wasn't entrance control on an incident like this) was either part of the bad guy conspiracy and so fudged the log, or was incredibly, criminally incompetent, or was blackmailed by the bad guy.
If it weren't for the completely improbably incompetent entrance control person, the book would've ended much sooner, though, so I guess the author figured most people would never notice that loose end and just carried on.
This is the first Nevada Barr book I've read, and I've only been meaning to read it for 8 years. she writes murder mysteries set at different national parks,and this one happens to be set at my park! So ever since I started working at Carlsbad, visitors have been asking if I've read this.
I finally got it from the library, and it was a very quick read. It's a page turner and I was curious how the mystery would be solved. The descriptions of the park were great, if tainted slightly by the main character's claustrophobia. The villain wasn't obvious but there were some clues. Even though bad things happened in a cave, they weren't because of the cave being dangerous, they were because people are dangerous. So I was happy that Barr didn't lend to the myth that caves are unstable, crumbling, deadly places.
However, two things bugged. One minor, one major. Who hiked out of the cave in the first place to get help? Why were they never a suspect? everyone else who remained in the cave was an automatic suspect. Meanwhile, this person was never mentioned again.
And the major issue: entrance control. In cave rescues, there is ALWAYS someone as entrance control who records everyone and everything that goes in and comes out. I can't rant too much about this without giving away a major plot point, but this annoyed me to no end. I ended up deciding the anonymous entrance control person (because there's no way there wasn't entrance control on an incident like this) was either part of the bad guy conspiracy and so fudged the log, or was incredibly, criminally incompetent, or was blackmailed by the bad guy.
If it weren't for the completely improbably incompetent entrance control person, the book would've ended much sooner, though, so I guess the author figured most people would never notice that loose end and just carried on.
March 23, 2021
I picked this one up on a visit to my brother's. First visit since last summer 'cause of Covid. A friend has been recommending Ms. Barr's books for a while. Pretty good so far. Never get me to crawl around underground like that. NEVER!
Anna is now INSIDE Planet Earth and not liking it much. But ... the show must go on and she signed up for it. I suppose I did too, I'm about as happy about it as she is and I'm only READING about it. My uneasiness is a tribute to the skills of the author. And deeper we go ...
So, Anna is now out of the cave and into the light, but another body has hit the NM dust and the killer(s) is/are after her too. I wonder if she'll wind up back in that nasty cave. She did wind up briefly in a different cave ... Genre conventions are in place. Instead of an English manor house our victims and culprits are in a cave(for a while at least. The author has skillfully brought pretty much everyone under suspicion, including some who could NOT have injured Frieda in the first place 'cause they weren't there when she got hurt. It's getting complicated for Anna.
- One GR reviewer points out that the caver who departed with news of Frieda's injury could have been the guilty party. No mentioned by Anna or the author, however. But ... would that person(if the guilty party) have left the job unfinished?
- "Memories could and were implanted ..." s.b. "Memories could be and were implanted ..."
- I THINK the author is deliberately having Anna forget something Frieda said while semi-delirious.
Anyway, the book ends with an in-cave climax. You knew that Anna would have to go back inside. It's not as creepy the second time around. The guilty party is someone who has a hidden evil streak. Isn't that just ... TYPICAL?!?!
- NB and Tony H. both write mysteries set in the SW USA. I like his writing a little better. A bit less dramatic/ominous and more straightforward.
- 3.25* rounds down to 3*
Anna is now INSIDE Planet Earth and not liking it much. But ... the show must go on and she signed up for it. I suppose I did too, I'm about as happy about it as she is and I'm only READING about it. My uneasiness is a tribute to the skills of the author. And deeper we go ...
So, Anna is now out of the cave and into the light, but another body has hit the NM dust and the killer(s) is/are after her too. I wonder if she'll wind up back in that nasty cave. She did wind up briefly in a different cave ... Genre conventions are in place. Instead of an English manor house our victims and culprits are in a cave(for a while at least. The author has skillfully brought pretty much everyone under suspicion, including some who could NOT have injured Frieda in the first place 'cause they weren't there when she got hurt. It's getting complicated for Anna.
- One GR reviewer points out that the caver who departed with news of Frieda's injury could have been the guilty party. No mentioned by Anna or the author, however. But ... would that person(if the guilty party) have left the job unfinished?
- "Memories could and were implanted ..." s.b. "Memories could be and were implanted ..."
- I THINK the author is deliberately having Anna forget something Frieda said while semi-delirious.
Anyway, the book ends with an in-cave climax. You knew that Anna would have to go back inside. It's not as creepy the second time around. The guilty party is someone who has a hidden evil streak. Isn't that just ... TYPICAL?!?!
- NB and Tony H. both write mysteries set in the SW USA. I like his writing a little better. A bit less dramatic/ominous and more straightforward.
- 3.25* rounds down to 3*
November 21, 2018
Book six in the mystery series starring U.S. Park Ranger Anna Pigeon takes Anna to New Mexico’s Carlsbad Caverns, where one of her friends, and an avid caver, has been seriously injured while exploring a new (and not open to the public) cave system. Frieda has a serious head injury and is mostly unconscious, but she has asked for Anna. So, Anna swallows her claustrophobia to come to her friend’s aid. In a brief moment of lucidity, Frieda tells Anna that it was not an accident.
Much of the action in this book takes place in the confined spaces underground, and Barr spends a lot of time setting up the mystery and going into excruciating detail on the difficulties of exploring such a cave. I felt a little claustrophobic myself a few times.
I like Anna; she’s mentally and physically strong, intelligent, independent, and fiercely determined. Barr includes issues of corporate greed and environmental concerns, while extolling the majestic beauty of pristine caves, and praising the dedication of scientists and volunteers who try to map newly discovered underground treasures.
This is a totally satisfying mystery in a series with a strong female lead.
Much of the action in this book takes place in the confined spaces underground, and Barr spends a lot of time setting up the mystery and going into excruciating detail on the difficulties of exploring such a cave. I felt a little claustrophobic myself a few times.
I like Anna; she’s mentally and physically strong, intelligent, independent, and fiercely determined. Barr includes issues of corporate greed and environmental concerns, while extolling the majestic beauty of pristine caves, and praising the dedication of scientists and volunteers who try to map newly discovered underground treasures.
This is a totally satisfying mystery in a series with a strong female lead.
September 30, 2015
Anna is as depressing and as crazy as always. Nature dominates the scene 70% of the time and once again murder is attempted and committed due to environmental reasons... There is this really disturbing way in which a friend of hers dies.... Yea, I will not forget it, especially when climbing... Good book for this series.
August 15, 2020
I've always enjoyed Nevada Barr's books but this one just didn't work for me. NB's excellent writing and characters just couldn't overcome a slow plot and too much description. Perhaps it was me but I was disappointed. I don't want to quit reading her books. I will wait awhile and try one again sometime in the future.
May 21, 2017
Atmospheric barely begins to describe this crime story set mainly underground in New Mexico's Lechuguilla cavern system. Park Ranger Anna Pigeon is called to join a Search and Rescue party after a ranger is injured underground. They face a few days of trek to the injured woman and a few more days of stretchering her out, filled with climbing, crawling, wading and walking on rough stone. But when Anna reaches her friend, she starts to suspect that the accidental head injury was no accident. Given that all of the original party is now with the rescue party, someone present must be an attempted murderer. And they are days from the entrance - or nights, since there is no natural light.
As well as the eerie and beautiful location, which is extremely well realised, we find the rules for travel in a pristine environment. For instance, you pack it in, you pack it out. Including food wrappers, spent batteries and bodily wastes. With no means of communication, the party must stay together and organise. And two backup lights for your main light may not be enough.
This is a cracking read for lovers of nature, crime stories and fiction in unusual settings.
As well as the eerie and beautiful location, which is extremely well realised, we find the rules for travel in a pristine environment. For instance, you pack it in, you pack it out. Including food wrappers, spent batteries and bodily wastes. With no means of communication, the party must stay together and organise. And two backup lights for your main light may not be enough.
This is a cracking read for lovers of nature, crime stories and fiction in unusual settings.
May 6, 2014
Blind Descent was the first mystery I've read in the Anna Pigeon series by Nevada Barr. I had to read it-it takes place in the Carlsbad Caverns of New Mexico.
It took me a little while to get used to Barr's writing style but once I got it, I found the story as gripping as a roller-coaster ride. I feel like I have actually been spelunking (exploring caves). Good thing-since after reading this, I will undoubtedly never try the real thing. Or probably even visit Carlsbad.
Yeah, that scary.
And, also yeah, highly recommended.
It took me a little while to get used to Barr's writing style but once I got it, I found the story as gripping as a roller-coaster ride. I feel like I have actually been spelunking (exploring caves). Good thing-since after reading this, I will undoubtedly never try the real thing. Or probably even visit Carlsbad.
Yeah, that scary.
And, also yeah, highly recommended.
October 13, 2021
This was a white knuckle ride beneath the earth. Barr's descriptions of Anna's journey through the caves made me feel as afraid as Anna felt. Well done!
September 27, 2020
Are you afraid of caves? I've been in a number of developed caves, and that's fine. But I wouldn't go into an undeveloped cave. Not again. I had a bad experience at summer camp when I was 14. We went caving with counselors, and three of us became separated from the group. We didn't know the route they'd taken and there was a sheer drop-off near us. We screamed and fortunately someone heard us and came back for us.
In Nevada Barr's "Blind Descent", the 6th Anna Pigeon novel, Anna, a ranger serving at Mesa Verde National Park, is tapped to assist in the rescue of a caver with an broken leg and head injury inside Lechuguilla, a vast cave in Carlsbad Caverns National Park. If you're not familiar with the Anna Pigeon series, each book involves Anna's skills as an outdoors-woman and as a detective. In this case, the injured woman is a co-worker of Anna's, who has asked specifically for her, and tells her when she arrives that her injury was not an accident. Cue the cheesy film noir music!
In this book, my favorite passages (pun intended!) included Barr's descriptions of fear and the human touch, which I recognized as absolutely authentic:
"Orange plastic surveyor's tape marked both sides, the dirt between pounded and tracked. This surprising touch of humanity gave Anna back a morsel of control, and she felt the grip of muscles on the scruff of her neck loosen somewhat."
... and of cynicism:
"Cynicism was okay, bitterness a pain in the neck. The hairline difference between the two was hope and humor. The cynic had both, the embittered, nothing."
... and of the sparse beauty of the desert southwest:
"North of the park the country was beautiful only to an eye acclimatized to the desert's idiosyncratic allure." I love that line. It also made me think of Georgia O'Keeffe, who saw limitless beauty there, even in small things like flowers and cattle skulls.
In Nevada Barr's "Blind Descent", the 6th Anna Pigeon novel, Anna, a ranger serving at Mesa Verde National Park, is tapped to assist in the rescue of a caver with an broken leg and head injury inside Lechuguilla, a vast cave in Carlsbad Caverns National Park. If you're not familiar with the Anna Pigeon series, each book involves Anna's skills as an outdoors-woman and as a detective. In this case, the injured woman is a co-worker of Anna's, who has asked specifically for her, and tells her when she arrives that her injury was not an accident. Cue the cheesy film noir music!
In this book, my favorite passages (pun intended!) included Barr's descriptions of fear and the human touch, which I recognized as absolutely authentic:
"Orange plastic surveyor's tape marked both sides, the dirt between pounded and tracked. This surprising touch of humanity gave Anna back a morsel of control, and she felt the grip of muscles on the scruff of her neck loosen somewhat."
... and of cynicism:
"Cynicism was okay, bitterness a pain in the neck. The hairline difference between the two was hope and humor. The cynic had both, the embittered, nothing."
... and of the sparse beauty of the desert southwest:
"North of the park the country was beautiful only to an eye acclimatized to the desert's idiosyncratic allure." I love that line. It also made me think of Georgia O'Keeffe, who saw limitless beauty there, even in small things like flowers and cattle skulls.
February 18, 2008
I love the Anna Pigeon mysteries, but I had hard time with this because I spent so much time feeling claustrophobic! I'm not a claustrophobe in most situations, but caves and underground make me feel trapped, as there's only one way out. I guess this says something for her writing, that she was able to make it real enough to bother me.
Good story, anyway.
Good story, anyway.
January 6, 2021
The Anna Pigeon series is comprised of murder mysteries that all take place in Federal Parks. The author is an ex-ranger and knows her stuff.
This latest entry takes place in the Carlsbad Caves in New Mexico. About half the book takes place underground and the author absolutely captures the visceral, claustrophobic feeling of being beneath the ground.
As a kid I was unsettled in Tom Sawyer when Tom and Becky get lost in the caves, and the feeling reading this book was very similar. This is the best Anna Pigeon book that I’ve read so far and unlike many other series the books are getting better instead of worse as the series goes on.
This latest entry takes place in the Carlsbad Caves in New Mexico. About half the book takes place underground and the author absolutely captures the visceral, claustrophobic feeling of being beneath the ground.
As a kid I was unsettled in Tom Sawyer when Tom and Becky get lost in the caves, and the feeling reading this book was very similar. This is the best Anna Pigeon book that I’ve read so far and unlike many other series the books are getting better instead of worse as the series goes on.
July 3, 2023
On the whole it was an intriguing mystery but the excruciating detail of the caving equipment, set-up, gear, etc. went on a bit too much for someone who has never and will never do "cave dives." Very technical. Other than that, a good story.
October 25, 2015
Another Anna Pigeon adventure - this one in Lechugilla Cave at Carlsbad. Typical stuff happens - there's an accident but it could be murder and Anna will crack the case even if her superiors tell her to mind her own business.
But I have to wonder this. Every year someone is killed and Anna says "It wasn't an accident!" Then someone tries to kill Anna but she stops them and they turn out to be the murderer. She's always right. So why, every year when this happens and Anna says, "Hey, that wasn't an accident!" they don't believe her? Also, in reality, she might have decided to go into a different line of work. . . .
But they're book candy so I keep on reading!
But I have to wonder this. Every year someone is killed and Anna says "It wasn't an accident!" Then someone tries to kill Anna but she stops them and they turn out to be the murderer. She's always right. So why, every year when this happens and Anna says, "Hey, that wasn't an accident!" they don't believe her? Also, in reality, she might have decided to go into a different line of work. . . .
But they're book candy so I keep on reading!
February 3, 2010
Brilliant, scary, thrilling, all good. Only problem was that in solving the mystery, Anna considers all the possible people and omits one. Someone had to get word out that there was someone injured inside. The people that enter were not there before so they were not the ones that come out. (She makes it clear that no radio can get out through these caves.) So the perpetrator could have left the cave never to be seen again. BIG omission, imho, but other than that, this is her best novel to date.
October 19, 2014
Probably my favorite of the series so far ... even with the discomfort brought on by her excellent descriptions of claustrophobic feelings. I'm done with caves. Have visited the Mark Twain Cave a few times and one in eastern Tennessee. ( I forget the name). They are beautiful, but I have no desire to venture into one again.
March 10, 2016
Totally superb thriller. Exceptionally interesting writing, sympathetic characters, intriguing who-done-it, wonderful scenery. My favorite Anna Pigeon story and a Top Ten of all novels I have read.
December 28, 2019
I gave this 122 pages and just couldn't continue. I'm an avid outdoor person but 120+ pages of the caving climb out was excessive. There was no excitement to it.
April 17, 2022
Forest Ranger Anna Pigeon’s friend and fellow employee Frieda Dierkz is trapped in one of the caves that make up New Mexico’s Carlsbad complex. The cave is not open to the public because forest rangers only recently discovered it and haven’t finished mapping it. Frieda is trapped in the cave, and it’s up to Anna to push back the darkness that is her claustrophobia and perform a rescue. Anna would eagerly step away from this assignment, but her friend specifically asked for her help. She knows how to climb and rappel, but she’s not sure how to handle crawling through tunnels and handle the perpetual darkness of underground caverns.
Gamely battling her demons, Anna arrives at her friend’s side inside the cave. For a while, Frieda is lucid, and it looks like she’ll get out ok. Then another rockslide erupts as they are moving Frieda to safety. This time, debris from the slide kills her. Was the slide a natural event? Could Frieda’s luck be that bad? Investigating the slide, anna convinces herself there is a butt print in the earth at the point where human feet pushing could start a slide. Someone murdered Frieda.
But the murders don’t stop once the body is above ground. Anna, while investigating, dodges high-power rifle shots and finds the body of Brent Roxbury on the desert floor. A member of Frieda’s rescue party, he is dead beyond doubt.
And where the heck is Sondra McCartey? Her husband, Peter, was one of Frieda’s rescuers, and Sondra attached herself to the rescue team to write about the adventure. She and Peter aren’t happily married these days. That’s evidenced by the fact that Peter is engaging in some brazen sex with another female park ranger rescuer. The only thing under ground about it is that it’s happening under Sondra’s nose inside the cave. That makes Sondra a high-profile suspect in Anna’s eyes.
The final five percent of the book is suspenseful beyond measure. I didn’t see the solution to the mystery until Barr revealed it. And that final five percent? I can only advise you to grip your book player a little harder, shove that earbud in a little deeper, and for goodness sakes, keep your heart pills handy!
Gamely battling her demons, Anna arrives at her friend’s side inside the cave. For a while, Frieda is lucid, and it looks like she’ll get out ok. Then another rockslide erupts as they are moving Frieda to safety. This time, debris from the slide kills her. Was the slide a natural event? Could Frieda’s luck be that bad? Investigating the slide, anna convinces herself there is a butt print in the earth at the point where human feet pushing could start a slide. Someone murdered Frieda.
But the murders don’t stop once the body is above ground. Anna, while investigating, dodges high-power rifle shots and finds the body of Brent Roxbury on the desert floor. A member of Frieda’s rescue party, he is dead beyond doubt.
And where the heck is Sondra McCartey? Her husband, Peter, was one of Frieda’s rescuers, and Sondra attached herself to the rescue team to write about the adventure. She and Peter aren’t happily married these days. That’s evidenced by the fact that Peter is engaging in some brazen sex with another female park ranger rescuer. The only thing under ground about it is that it’s happening under Sondra’s nose inside the cave. That makes Sondra a high-profile suspect in Anna’s eyes.
The final five percent of the book is suspenseful beyond measure. I didn’t see the solution to the mystery until Barr revealed it. And that final five percent? I can only advise you to grip your book player a little harder, shove that earbud in a little deeper, and for goodness sakes, keep your heart pills handy!
January 11, 2023
Couldn’t put it down. I’m a fan of National Parks and Ms. Barr’s books and have read several Anna Pigeon novels but this one in Carlsbad Cavern was the most spellbinding one I’ve read. It largely takes place in separate Lechuguilla Cave, on Park lands, the deepest cave system in the US and closed off to the public. The mystery and twists will keep you guessing until the end, and the nightmare of spelunking in the dark will keep you awake at night!
August 7, 2018
Nevada Barr's sixth novel featuring park ranger Anna Pigeon is set in New Mexico's Carlsbad Caverns. The location is known to the National Park Service as CACA. The area contains two of the most famous caves in the world, one of which, Lechuguilla, now harbors an injured caver who is also a close friend of Anna's.
I have never once in my life had the desire to explore caves. I am not really claustrophobic but I don't like the idea of being underground. Anna, on the other hand, suffers badly from claustrophobia. If it hadn't been her dear friend Frieda lying 800 feet below the surface with a concussion and a broken leg, Anna would have begged off.
Now, having read the book with all of Anna's terror and all the minute details of how to maneuver down and through the cave's passages, I am well assured that staying out of caves is the best decision for me. I also learned that I have missed seeing some of the most beautiful formations in the world but I am fine with that. Nevada Barr's exquisite descriptions and Google will suffice.
The first part of the book tells about the harrowing rescue effort to extract Frieda and is a heartstopping tale of extreme adventure . When Anna learns that the accident might actually have been an attempt on the woman's life, the tension mounts. Which of the caving team did it?
I just cannot reveal any more about the plot without serious spoilers. Once the rescue team and the original exploration team finally get out of Lechuguilla, there is an unfortunate lull in the action. Just as we all caught our breath though, the stakes are kicked up several notches and Anna finally exposes the culprits.
It is hard to imagine how Nevada Barr is going to top this one.
I have never once in my life had the desire to explore caves. I am not really claustrophobic but I don't like the idea of being underground. Anna, on the other hand, suffers badly from claustrophobia. If it hadn't been her dear friend Frieda lying 800 feet below the surface with a concussion and a broken leg, Anna would have begged off.
Now, having read the book with all of Anna's terror and all the minute details of how to maneuver down and through the cave's passages, I am well assured that staying out of caves is the best decision for me. I also learned that I have missed seeing some of the most beautiful formations in the world but I am fine with that. Nevada Barr's exquisite descriptions and Google will suffice.
The first part of the book tells about the harrowing rescue effort to extract Frieda and is a heartstopping tale of extreme adventure . When Anna learns that the accident might actually have been an attempt on the woman's life, the tension mounts. Which of the caving team did it?
I just cannot reveal any more about the plot without serious spoilers. Once the rescue team and the original exploration team finally get out of Lechuguilla, there is an unfortunate lull in the action. Just as we all caught our breath though, the stakes are kicked up several notches and Anna finally exposes the culprits.
It is hard to imagine how Nevada Barr is going to top this one.
June 8, 2021
Claustrophobic? Scared of the Dark? Join Anna Pidgeon, park ranger, as she conquers her fears and joins cavers in a rescue mission that develops into a murder mystery. Atmospheric and page turning, you venture into the depths of Lechuguilla caves in Carlsbad New Mexico. This is a “stand alone” book in a series. You can read this on it’s own. Highly recommended on Audio as the narrator is so good! Just finished this as a re-read.
June 7, 2018
Enjoyable mystery that kept me guessing. Not being a caver, I had some trouble picturing some of the things they were doing in the caves and sometimes I got confused trying to keep all the characters straight. I do love that these books are set in the National Parks and I feel like I get a behind the scenes tour in each book.
August 26, 2023
Back on the Audible series (unabridged!)
It’s funny how many times I want her to have a cell phone with her in the 90s i(despite being n remote parks where there might not even be any service, or in this case, underground) but at least to take pictures. Another variation on the locked room puzzle with an unexpected outside influence. Again, and maybe this is a trademark, one of the mysteries to solve is whether the other mysteries are related. And, hey, when did ‘spelunking’ become ‘caving’?
A satisfactory ending, if a bit abrupt. I was missing a wrap-up with the Tillmans.
It’s funny how many times I want her to have a cell phone with her in the 90s i(despite being n remote parks where there might not even be any service, or in this case, underground) but at least to take pictures. Another variation on the locked room puzzle with an unexpected outside influence. Again, and maybe this is a trademark, one of the mysteries to solve is whether the other mysteries are related. And, hey, when did ‘spelunking’ become ‘caving’?
A satisfactory ending, if a bit abrupt. I was missing a wrap-up with the Tillmans.
April 30, 2020
This series does not disappoint and I liked the character development. Will read on!
November 14, 2023
This reminded me of that horror movie The Descent. There is nothing more terrifying than being trapped underground in a cave. No spelunking for this ol' girl!!!!
March 27, 2022
The interesting and tense beginning and ending make up for a somewhat subdued middle section. I still like this series, will continue.
September 24, 2025
Another great standalone story of the witty and resilient Anna Pigeon. Minus one star for my own incomprehensibility for understanding the cave system. Even the map in the front couldn’t help me. The descriptions were thorough, but I just had trouble.
Favorite passages:
Her love of bats might have overcome her fear of enclosed spaces, but if one waited, the splendid little creatures were good enough to come out and be enjoyed in less stygian realms.
Oscar looked as homey and leggy as a spider in his web.
In the world above, the memory of which was already fading, there were signs and portents, clues that let one know one was alive: breezes, birdsong and crickets, the sound of distant thunder, the smell of sage. Here, the silence was absolute, the only sounds those of their own making.
In this place unmarked by the rise and fall of the sun, the tides, the seasons, time ceased to have meaning.
He radiated competence.
“I’m okay with it,” Anna said, wondering at the ease with which she kissed off her last chance.
“Lookie,” Holden said, politely ignoring her personal crisis. “Cave pearls.”
With this absolute freedom came absolute peace.
Light served only to beckon forth the shadows and veil secrets.
Ron gets to that big, old, friendly rock and spread-eagles himself across it like a love-struck starfish.
not quite a hundred yards as the crow flies—should a crow choose such a batlike endeavor—
“He’s good,” Holden said admiringly. “The man is good. He could thread himself through all four stomachs of a cow and never even give her the hiccups.”
Anna hadn’t slowed the cavers down. She hadn’t gotten hurt. And she hadn’t gone nuts. All in all, a successful day.
For a horrifying moment she didn’t know where she was; then, with no decrease in the horror, she did.
Some liars were just too good, some honest people just naturally twitchy.
she thought how good it was for people to be heroes, how much joy and confidence had been lost when the American public turned the care of themselves and their neighbors over to the impersonal rescuers of government agencies: police, fire fighters, paramedics, park rangers.
“Do you have any idea why somebody would want to push a rock on you?” “No reason. I’m a secretary, for Chrissake.” Anna wasn’t sure being a secretary was as harmless as Frieda thought
If two people know a secret, it is no longer a secret. On long car trips Anna and her sister used to amuse themselves by planning the perfect murder. The catch was always that you couldn’t tell anyone, not a soul. And where’s the fun in doing anything perfectly if no one else knows about it?
I’m very shallow. It’s one of the things I like most about myself.
The alligator was ideal.
Anna racked her brain for a gift to leave her with, but the dead are hell to buy for.
The “trail” they’d been calling the goat track was like the dotted line on a cartographer’s drawing; it existed only in their minds. Reality was a stretch of rock that could be navigated only by borrowing from the traveling techniques of spiders, monkeys, starfish, and weasels.
A truth Anna had long suspected was ratified: we are one another’s angels. No unearthly sound could have been so glorious. “Life is like a mountain railroad with an engineer that’s brave. We must make the run successful from the cradle to the grave,” soared through their miserable night, powered by notes of youth, tones of raw faith in the inherent goodness of existence. Old-time gospel had a healing power bloodless intellectual faith could not lay claim to.
He looked less like a hero than a complete lunatic.
The implication that Anna would, of course, sit and wait docilely till summoned was strong. At an early age a serious streak of contrariness had been discovered in Anna. The only two stickers she’d ever considered slathering on her Rambler’s bumper read “God Bless John Wayne” and “Question Authority.”
The hair was black as construction paper, flat and rough. Bangs and sides were cut short and teased high on the crown. Hair was molded into flying wings above each ear with industrial-strength hair spray. From the front the coif looked big, a lion’s mane. From the side the effect was lost. The volume was two-dimensional; the popular style always made Anna think of the false fronts on buildings along movie Main Streets of the Old West.
Jewel looked pesterproof.
“I got Anna Pigeon,” she said with the air of a shop-keeper offering inferior but available merchandise.
Laymon ushered her gallantly—but ever so correctly, without a hint of condescension or sexism—to the single chair in his office. Padded, the seat and back covered with nubbly brown fabric, the visitor’s chair, though significantly less grand, matched his desk chair. The desk matched a computer credenza behind it, against the windowed wall. The carpet was new, the potted plant in the corner alive. George Laymon obviously rated.
Laymon was a spectacularly average individual.
Graying hair, good build, and regular features made him a handsome man. Anna guessed he was fifty-five or sixty, and had little doubt he could still have been quite the ladies’ man but for one thing: he wasn’t interested.
Anna guessed it was something harder to come by than sex or affection that fueled his inner fires. Imposing order. Maybe knowledge. Attributes that could make him good at his job. Controlled zealots were just the people needed for the daunting task of saving what was left of the environment. “Brent sure looks like shit,” Anna said, making conversation.
Never having had children, she could not fathom the sort of pain the woman must be suffering. She knew only the loss of a husband, a father, and several very good cats. If it was worse than that, she was impressed that Dottie remained upright and coherent.
“Quite lavish,” she said, and managed to convey disapproval without so much as a lifted eyebrow or a lowered tone. “I don’t know his wife well.” She sounded like she didn’t care to rectify that situation in the foreseeable future.
since she was freelance, there was no place of business whose business it was to keep tabs on her whereabouts.
an old garage with a door that wouldn’t close, two trucks, a horse trailer with one flat tire, a barn with a horse without sense enough to get in out of the rain standing miserably nearby, and a dog house, sans dog, with a peeling tar-paper roof.
Holden’s wife was young enough and pretty enough to dislike on sight, but she gave Anna two homemade oatmeal cookies and a glass of white Zinfandel so Anna decided to overlook her faults.
but Rhonda had never heard much against him besides the occasional snipe because his wife was too young, his equipment too new, his hair too well cut.
Zeddie had more life in her than the rest. Relief wasn’t evident, or sorrow. Anger was fueling her. In one so young it was impossible to mistake. She’d not yet learned to hide her feelings from the world’s freezing indifference. The source of her aggravation wasn’t hard to find.
In this atmosphere of opportunistic hedonism, Anna noticed the warmth of Schatz’s thigh pressed against hers. She could hear the hush of his breath and smell the soap he’d showered with. A lovely young man, she thought, and felt a pleasant tingle.
a ragged crevice with plenty of ledges upon which a small and determined woman could find footholds.
The engine fired up without complaint, and she promised herself she’d write General Motors a thank-you note if she made it back to a post office alive.
women in law enforcement were out-shooting their male counterparts on the rifle and pistol range. They seemed to have a natural aptitude for it. Lining up a bead on a target was not unlike threading a needle, plucking a splinter from a toddler’s finger, dotting the “i” in icing on a birthday cake: hand to eye, steady nerves. They were born to it.
Cowboy cursing reminded her of low-fat ice cream: mildly ridiculous and totally unsatisfying.
Eschewing cowboy delicacy, she called down vile imprecations on all things living and dead, on the wind and the cold, the uneven dirt and the knife-edged plants. By the time she’d reached the truck she’d used up the vocabularies of several generations of sailors
crawl in the hot tub, and drink the forbidden juice of the grape.
The receptionist, a young Navajo man with shoulder-length black hair tied neatly in a ponytail, squeaked like a rabbit when Anna appeared in front of his desk.
Finally, she said, “Is Holden Tillman here? He’ll know what to do with me.”
Holden did everything right, wearing all hats at once: EMT, bureaucrat, husband, father, friend.
Holden underwent a marvelous metamorphosis…she watched him change from the uncertain palsied man who’d killed his patient through negligence to the confident man of understated command he’d been when she’d first met him.
This second murder proved the first. Holden was a born-again believer in the sacred butt-print.
He didn’t look like either his mother or his father but was one of those children who appear to have been fashioned by the fairies. There was an irrepressible impishness about him that delighted Anna even as she was glad she wouldn’t have to raise the boy.
It was a story of such magnitude, at least to her, that she would need to tell it several more times to dissipate its power, to get some kind of hold on it.
No wonder men were often frightened of women. They had a way of getting to the heart of things, a dangerous place sometimes. Lest she betray her weaknesses, Anna stopped talking. Giving her time to recover, Rhonda told how she had spent this cold and windy day. She’d not been chased, shot at, or dipped in blood, but she’d ferreted out a whole lot more information than Anna had.
“In using a government vehicle in an unauthorized manner, you have overstepped your bounds considerably. You have made remarks without substantiation that do not reflect well on the people here, people who worked so hard to save your friend. You have no authority in Carlsbad. You are a guest of this park. Until now we have been willing to cut you a good deal of slack because of what you have been through. You’ve used that slack, Anna. I can put you in touch with human resources either here or, better yet, in your home park, and we’ll get some counseling for you. Other than that, there is nothing we can do. Oscar and I have talked it over with the superintendent. This latest incident is a BLM matter. Your statement has been taken, but, as you arrived after the fact, you aren’t a material witness.” “Attempted murder, assault on a federal officer, illegal discharge of a firearm,” Anna said. “Whoever it was shot at me more than once. Malice.” George Laymon’s eyes strayed again out the window. “You had a bad scare,” he said carefully. “You think I’m making this up?” Anger boiled so hot the image of steam pouring from her ears didn’t seem so much ludicrous as inevitable.
“Or it could have been shot off like you say,” he said placatingly. Anna was not placated. “I just think there are many explanations you haven’t considered. You’re too close to this. Too personally involved. To put it bluntly, you’re out of line. It’s time you went home.” A brief maelstrom of emotions ranging from acute humiliation to homicidal rage seethed.
It was, as the bard had said, peevish and self-willed harlotry that bade her stay. Self-willed harlotry won. The time had come to grovel fetchingly.
I guess I needed to blame Frieda’s death on somebody human. God is so unsatisfying.”
Laymon couldn’t very well refuse to let her stay for the funeral of a coworker whose body she had found. That and a shrink appointment would buy her a few more days in which to continue wearing out her welcome.
In times past she’d learned a good deal more from watching people than from talking with them.
Knowing he’d fallen for her sister didn’t lower him in her estimation. To her way of thinking, Molly was quite a catch.
For the life of her, Anna couldn’t imagine why anyone would want to kill Frieda. Frieda Dierkz wasn’t even the sort of woman a stalker would fancy. She was a solid, straightforward, midwestern farm girl who had intelligence without cunning, discretion without guile. Her favorite drugs were legal. She didn’t gamble, steal, smuggle weapons, or traffic in illegally obtained artifacts. She was dispatcher and secretary to the chief ranger at Mesa Verde. Professionally she was indispensable, but she was not in a position to give or withhold anything worth killing for. If she had slept with married men, she had been as silent as the tomb. Anyway, Anna would have known. Everybody would have known. Parks made fishbowls look like the heart and soul of privacy.
Ted Bundy, criminologists were fond of pointing out, struck everybody as a heck of a swell fella.
“Old girlfriends love to talk, and your darling Peter has his share. Miss Sally poked around for me—well, not for me. I had to promise I’d say ‘hi’ to Holden for her, which I won’t, but she doesn’t know that.
“Not rape rape,” Rhonda told her once she’d gleaned the drama from her announcement.
Sixty-five minutes later she was outfitted with a Dodge Neon the color and stature of the average aphid
Credit cards were wonderful things.
A chance to stand out of the wind and impress the girls must have been the highlight of this driller’s day. He looked pleased with himself and his situation. Taking another drag, he embellished. “I knew the guy. We all did. Brent somebody or other.
To focus on the casket with its decaying reminder of mortality was morbid. To think of anything else was irreverent.
Roxbury didn’t leave this earth awash in tears. Every eye in the place was as dry as the north wind. Brent’s wife looked on with the drawn face of shock but without any indication of great sorrow.
With the exception of Brent’s wife, the mourners were uninteresting. She clung too close to her male companion to win any awards in the grieving widows category.
“It just occurred to me that I might be totally mistaken about nearly everything.” “I wouldn’t have any idea what that was like,” Curt said with apparent sincerity. “Bloody awful.” “I love it when you talk dirty in foreign languages.”
Even women who’d lost husbands they didn’t love or didn’t like—drunkards, philanderers, bums, and bores—staggered under the blow of their death. Most from that category recovered to flourish—or found another man to hate—in fairly short order. For the first few days though, widows of all stripes shared similar fear of the future and brutal severance from the past.
Roxbury’s wife smiled suddenly, and Anna knew why the dentist loved her. She had perfect teeth, square and white and even, not in the least feral. Totally beguiling.
Though death, violence, and infidelity intruded, Anna couldn’t but envy Amy. She loved her fat dentist with transparent girlish adoration.
“It’s too . . . too everything. Except green. Everything just dries up and blows away. Even the people are dry. Tough and strong. Stringy.” She laughed. “I guess you can tell I’m a southern girl. I don’t want to climb and ride horses and fight rattlesnakes. And nobody goes to church. Not that I’m a real churchy person, but it’s good for children to be raised in the church, a community, something to give them a sense of morals, of their place in God’s world. Potluck is a dirty word here, and only Indians play bingo.
Within, there was wine and food, a cat, and the companionship of three murder suspects. It felt like home to Anna.
and laughed because, despite the clichéd behavior, she had not gotten laid the night before. They had talked. And they had slept. A combination any woman worth her salt had to admit was better than sex three times out of five and a good deal harder to come by.
“But you didn’t see her?” “Would ya quit?” Jewel snapped in exasperation.
The SF-171 was an agonizingly detailed application form the Park Service had required for most of Anna’s career. Pages of constipated little boxes for the answering of complex questions.
Maybe this was one of those situations her grandmother had warned her about where more flies were caught with honey. Too late; the vinegar had already been served.
Anna was forwarded, patched through, brushed off, put on hold, and disconnected until she finally landed in an office of records in Washington, D.C. A mealy-voiced man went to some length to let her know that, though he worked for the army, he wasn’t an army man. Why she was supposed to care was beyond her, but she made a few appreciative noises so as not to alienate the fellow. His civilian status established, he was willing to look up the information she requested.
Hemming and hawing, he fussed, pretending the matter might be sensitive or classified. He was bored. He was unimportant. He wanted to be cajoled. Pepper-spraying him being out of the question, Anna grasped the ragged edge of patience and cajoled.
People had long memories, but they had short fuses.
such a sudden coupling after the separation of husband and wife spoke of great need or great assurance. Anna had assumed it was the wall of dirt between Peter and his spouse that gave them the confidence to turn to each other so publicly. A wall of dirt on top of that same spouse would be just as reassuring and a whole lot more final.
Two tourists, twined together like unpruned ivy
What she had here was either a misunderstanding or an undiagnosed psychopath.
“I hate to pry—” “Hah!” “Okay. I like to pry. How about this: Why in God’s name did Peter think it was such a terrific idea to go on an expedition with his wife and his girlfriend and his ex-girlfriend?” “The ex is no big deal,” Zeddie said. “That was years ago. Frieda and Peter were friends. Shoot, Frieda and I were friends. With the notable exception of the Boil, I’ve always liked Pete’s taste in women.”
“It does sound kinky when you put it like that. I was going through a bad time. Peter wanted to be with me. The sentiment was mutual.
the story had the mundane ring of truth
Secret lovers seldom fool anyone but themselves. The discipline of an Olivier is required to lie with body language over a protracted period. There’s too much to control: looks, gestures, position, voice. Women are especially adept at reading the signs. When a husband and a younger woman are involved, the senses become preternaturally acute.
The knowledge that bombs could fall, stock markets crash, and hemlines go up again, and none of it could touch her.
To the list of classic choices—rock and a hard place, devil and the deep blue sea—she added abyss and wormhole. Minutes after dawn in a world that grew increasingly unimaginable with each slithered mile
Curt drank noisily, his elbow jostling her each time he hoisted his water bottle. Close quarters foment love or war. “Nudge me one more time and you’re meat for cave crickets.”
Neither money nor marriage rings her chimes.
“Of course you’re not conservative. You have nothing to conserve.” Zeddie was still at an age at which “security” and “tedium” were synonyms.
“Hi, Sondra. Everybody’s been missing you,” Curt lied without a hitch.
Cavers the world over dreamed of, lived for, risked their lives in search of a room such as this. And she, a dirt-detesting claustrophobe, had found it. The fates have a wicked sense of humor.
They would not be sufficiently punished; drawing, quartering, and disemboweling were outlawed in New Mexico.
Anna opted for ambush. If one had to go down, it was cleaner to go down fighting than whimpering in the dark.
a natural husbandman. He took care of things: cars, cats, people, and did it in such a way it went unnoticed and unsung.
Discomfort and suspicions would not be enough to start a mutiny. Not where there was a crazy woman to be looked after.
Scuttling backward with her prize, like an alligator with a Pekinese
Leftover pride from watching Westerns as a child: die standing up. She wished she had her boots on.
Favorite passages:
Her love of bats might have overcome her fear of enclosed spaces, but if one waited, the splendid little creatures were good enough to come out and be enjoyed in less stygian realms.
Oscar looked as homey and leggy as a spider in his web.
In the world above, the memory of which was already fading, there were signs and portents, clues that let one know one was alive: breezes, birdsong and crickets, the sound of distant thunder, the smell of sage. Here, the silence was absolute, the only sounds those of their own making.
In this place unmarked by the rise and fall of the sun, the tides, the seasons, time ceased to have meaning.
He radiated competence.
“I’m okay with it,” Anna said, wondering at the ease with which she kissed off her last chance.
“Lookie,” Holden said, politely ignoring her personal crisis. “Cave pearls.”
With this absolute freedom came absolute peace.
Light served only to beckon forth the shadows and veil secrets.
Ron gets to that big, old, friendly rock and spread-eagles himself across it like a love-struck starfish.
not quite a hundred yards as the crow flies—should a crow choose such a batlike endeavor—
“He’s good,” Holden said admiringly. “The man is good. He could thread himself through all four stomachs of a cow and never even give her the hiccups.”
Anna hadn’t slowed the cavers down. She hadn’t gotten hurt. And she hadn’t gone nuts. All in all, a successful day.
For a horrifying moment she didn’t know where she was; then, with no decrease in the horror, she did.
Some liars were just too good, some honest people just naturally twitchy.
she thought how good it was for people to be heroes, how much joy and confidence had been lost when the American public turned the care of themselves and their neighbors over to the impersonal rescuers of government agencies: police, fire fighters, paramedics, park rangers.
“Do you have any idea why somebody would want to push a rock on you?” “No reason. I’m a secretary, for Chrissake.” Anna wasn’t sure being a secretary was as harmless as Frieda thought
If two people know a secret, it is no longer a secret. On long car trips Anna and her sister used to amuse themselves by planning the perfect murder. The catch was always that you couldn’t tell anyone, not a soul. And where’s the fun in doing anything perfectly if no one else knows about it?
I’m very shallow. It’s one of the things I like most about myself.
The alligator was ideal.
Anna racked her brain for a gift to leave her with, but the dead are hell to buy for.
The “trail” they’d been calling the goat track was like the dotted line on a cartographer’s drawing; it existed only in their minds. Reality was a stretch of rock that could be navigated only by borrowing from the traveling techniques of spiders, monkeys, starfish, and weasels.
A truth Anna had long suspected was ratified: we are one another’s angels. No unearthly sound could have been so glorious. “Life is like a mountain railroad with an engineer that’s brave. We must make the run successful from the cradle to the grave,” soared through their miserable night, powered by notes of youth, tones of raw faith in the inherent goodness of existence. Old-time gospel had a healing power bloodless intellectual faith could not lay claim to.
He looked less like a hero than a complete lunatic.
The implication that Anna would, of course, sit and wait docilely till summoned was strong. At an early age a serious streak of contrariness had been discovered in Anna. The only two stickers she’d ever considered slathering on her Rambler’s bumper read “God Bless John Wayne” and “Question Authority.”
The hair was black as construction paper, flat and rough. Bangs and sides were cut short and teased high on the crown. Hair was molded into flying wings above each ear with industrial-strength hair spray. From the front the coif looked big, a lion’s mane. From the side the effect was lost. The volume was two-dimensional; the popular style always made Anna think of the false fronts on buildings along movie Main Streets of the Old West.
Jewel looked pesterproof.
“I got Anna Pigeon,” she said with the air of a shop-keeper offering inferior but available merchandise.
Laymon ushered her gallantly—but ever so correctly, without a hint of condescension or sexism—to the single chair in his office. Padded, the seat and back covered with nubbly brown fabric, the visitor’s chair, though significantly less grand, matched his desk chair. The desk matched a computer credenza behind it, against the windowed wall. The carpet was new, the potted plant in the corner alive. George Laymon obviously rated.
Laymon was a spectacularly average individual.
Graying hair, good build, and regular features made him a handsome man. Anna guessed he was fifty-five or sixty, and had little doubt he could still have been quite the ladies’ man but for one thing: he wasn’t interested.
Anna guessed it was something harder to come by than sex or affection that fueled his inner fires. Imposing order. Maybe knowledge. Attributes that could make him good at his job. Controlled zealots were just the people needed for the daunting task of saving what was left of the environment. “Brent sure looks like shit,” Anna said, making conversation.
Never having had children, she could not fathom the sort of pain the woman must be suffering. She knew only the loss of a husband, a father, and several very good cats. If it was worse than that, she was impressed that Dottie remained upright and coherent.
“Quite lavish,” she said, and managed to convey disapproval without so much as a lifted eyebrow or a lowered tone. “I don’t know his wife well.” She sounded like she didn’t care to rectify that situation in the foreseeable future.
since she was freelance, there was no place of business whose business it was to keep tabs on her whereabouts.
an old garage with a door that wouldn’t close, two trucks, a horse trailer with one flat tire, a barn with a horse without sense enough to get in out of the rain standing miserably nearby, and a dog house, sans dog, with a peeling tar-paper roof.
Holden’s wife was young enough and pretty enough to dislike on sight, but she gave Anna two homemade oatmeal cookies and a glass of white Zinfandel so Anna decided to overlook her faults.
but Rhonda had never heard much against him besides the occasional snipe because his wife was too young, his equipment too new, his hair too well cut.
Zeddie had more life in her than the rest. Relief wasn’t evident, or sorrow. Anger was fueling her. In one so young it was impossible to mistake. She’d not yet learned to hide her feelings from the world’s freezing indifference. The source of her aggravation wasn’t hard to find.
In this atmosphere of opportunistic hedonism, Anna noticed the warmth of Schatz’s thigh pressed against hers. She could hear the hush of his breath and smell the soap he’d showered with. A lovely young man, she thought, and felt a pleasant tingle.
a ragged crevice with plenty of ledges upon which a small and determined woman could find footholds.
The engine fired up without complaint, and she promised herself she’d write General Motors a thank-you note if she made it back to a post office alive.
women in law enforcement were out-shooting their male counterparts on the rifle and pistol range. They seemed to have a natural aptitude for it. Lining up a bead on a target was not unlike threading a needle, plucking a splinter from a toddler’s finger, dotting the “i” in icing on a birthday cake: hand to eye, steady nerves. They were born to it.
Cowboy cursing reminded her of low-fat ice cream: mildly ridiculous and totally unsatisfying.
Eschewing cowboy delicacy, she called down vile imprecations on all things living and dead, on the wind and the cold, the uneven dirt and the knife-edged plants. By the time she’d reached the truck she’d used up the vocabularies of several generations of sailors
crawl in the hot tub, and drink the forbidden juice of the grape.
The receptionist, a young Navajo man with shoulder-length black hair tied neatly in a ponytail, squeaked like a rabbit when Anna appeared in front of his desk.
Finally, she said, “Is Holden Tillman here? He’ll know what to do with me.”
Holden did everything right, wearing all hats at once: EMT, bureaucrat, husband, father, friend.
Holden underwent a marvelous metamorphosis…she watched him change from the uncertain palsied man who’d killed his patient through negligence to the confident man of understated command he’d been when she’d first met him.
This second murder proved the first. Holden was a born-again believer in the sacred butt-print.
He didn’t look like either his mother or his father but was one of those children who appear to have been fashioned by the fairies. There was an irrepressible impishness about him that delighted Anna even as she was glad she wouldn’t have to raise the boy.
It was a story of such magnitude, at least to her, that she would need to tell it several more times to dissipate its power, to get some kind of hold on it.
No wonder men were often frightened of women. They had a way of getting to the heart of things, a dangerous place sometimes. Lest she betray her weaknesses, Anna stopped talking. Giving her time to recover, Rhonda told how she had spent this cold and windy day. She’d not been chased, shot at, or dipped in blood, but she’d ferreted out a whole lot more information than Anna had.
“In using a government vehicle in an unauthorized manner, you have overstepped your bounds considerably. You have made remarks without substantiation that do not reflect well on the people here, people who worked so hard to save your friend. You have no authority in Carlsbad. You are a guest of this park. Until now we have been willing to cut you a good deal of slack because of what you have been through. You’ve used that slack, Anna. I can put you in touch with human resources either here or, better yet, in your home park, and we’ll get some counseling for you. Other than that, there is nothing we can do. Oscar and I have talked it over with the superintendent. This latest incident is a BLM matter. Your statement has been taken, but, as you arrived after the fact, you aren’t a material witness.” “Attempted murder, assault on a federal officer, illegal discharge of a firearm,” Anna said. “Whoever it was shot at me more than once. Malice.” George Laymon’s eyes strayed again out the window. “You had a bad scare,” he said carefully. “You think I’m making this up?” Anger boiled so hot the image of steam pouring from her ears didn’t seem so much ludicrous as inevitable.
“Or it could have been shot off like you say,” he said placatingly. Anna was not placated. “I just think there are many explanations you haven’t considered. You’re too close to this. Too personally involved. To put it bluntly, you’re out of line. It’s time you went home.” A brief maelstrom of emotions ranging from acute humiliation to homicidal rage seethed.
It was, as the bard had said, peevish and self-willed harlotry that bade her stay. Self-willed harlotry won. The time had come to grovel fetchingly.
I guess I needed to blame Frieda’s death on somebody human. God is so unsatisfying.”
Laymon couldn’t very well refuse to let her stay for the funeral of a coworker whose body she had found. That and a shrink appointment would buy her a few more days in which to continue wearing out her welcome.
In times past she’d learned a good deal more from watching people than from talking with them.
Knowing he’d fallen for her sister didn’t lower him in her estimation. To her way of thinking, Molly was quite a catch.
For the life of her, Anna couldn’t imagine why anyone would want to kill Frieda. Frieda Dierkz wasn’t even the sort of woman a stalker would fancy. She was a solid, straightforward, midwestern farm girl who had intelligence without cunning, discretion without guile. Her favorite drugs were legal. She didn’t gamble, steal, smuggle weapons, or traffic in illegally obtained artifacts. She was dispatcher and secretary to the chief ranger at Mesa Verde. Professionally she was indispensable, but she was not in a position to give or withhold anything worth killing for. If she had slept with married men, she had been as silent as the tomb. Anyway, Anna would have known. Everybody would have known. Parks made fishbowls look like the heart and soul of privacy.
Ted Bundy, criminologists were fond of pointing out, struck everybody as a heck of a swell fella.
“Old girlfriends love to talk, and your darling Peter has his share. Miss Sally poked around for me—well, not for me. I had to promise I’d say ‘hi’ to Holden for her, which I won’t, but she doesn’t know that.
“Not rape rape,” Rhonda told her once she’d gleaned the drama from her announcement.
Sixty-five minutes later she was outfitted with a Dodge Neon the color and stature of the average aphid
Credit cards were wonderful things.
A chance to stand out of the wind and impress the girls must have been the highlight of this driller’s day. He looked pleased with himself and his situation. Taking another drag, he embellished. “I knew the guy. We all did. Brent somebody or other.
To focus on the casket with its decaying reminder of mortality was morbid. To think of anything else was irreverent.
Roxbury didn’t leave this earth awash in tears. Every eye in the place was as dry as the north wind. Brent’s wife looked on with the drawn face of shock but without any indication of great sorrow.
With the exception of Brent’s wife, the mourners were uninteresting. She clung too close to her male companion to win any awards in the grieving widows category.
“It just occurred to me that I might be totally mistaken about nearly everything.” “I wouldn’t have any idea what that was like,” Curt said with apparent sincerity. “Bloody awful.” “I love it when you talk dirty in foreign languages.”
Even women who’d lost husbands they didn’t love or didn’t like—drunkards, philanderers, bums, and bores—staggered under the blow of their death. Most from that category recovered to flourish—or found another man to hate—in fairly short order. For the first few days though, widows of all stripes shared similar fear of the future and brutal severance from the past.
Roxbury’s wife smiled suddenly, and Anna knew why the dentist loved her. She had perfect teeth, square and white and even, not in the least feral. Totally beguiling.
Though death, violence, and infidelity intruded, Anna couldn’t but envy Amy. She loved her fat dentist with transparent girlish adoration.
“It’s too . . . too everything. Except green. Everything just dries up and blows away. Even the people are dry. Tough and strong. Stringy.” She laughed. “I guess you can tell I’m a southern girl. I don’t want to climb and ride horses and fight rattlesnakes. And nobody goes to church. Not that I’m a real churchy person, but it’s good for children to be raised in the church, a community, something to give them a sense of morals, of their place in God’s world. Potluck is a dirty word here, and only Indians play bingo.
Within, there was wine and food, a cat, and the companionship of three murder suspects. It felt like home to Anna.
and laughed because, despite the clichéd behavior, she had not gotten laid the night before. They had talked. And they had slept. A combination any woman worth her salt had to admit was better than sex three times out of five and a good deal harder to come by.
“But you didn’t see her?” “Would ya quit?” Jewel snapped in exasperation.
The SF-171 was an agonizingly detailed application form the Park Service had required for most of Anna’s career. Pages of constipated little boxes for the answering of complex questions.
Maybe this was one of those situations her grandmother had warned her about where more flies were caught with honey. Too late; the vinegar had already been served.
Anna was forwarded, patched through, brushed off, put on hold, and disconnected until she finally landed in an office of records in Washington, D.C. A mealy-voiced man went to some length to let her know that, though he worked for the army, he wasn’t an army man. Why she was supposed to care was beyond her, but she made a few appreciative noises so as not to alienate the fellow. His civilian status established, he was willing to look up the information she requested.
Hemming and hawing, he fussed, pretending the matter might be sensitive or classified. He was bored. He was unimportant. He wanted to be cajoled. Pepper-spraying him being out of the question, Anna grasped the ragged edge of patience and cajoled.
People had long memories, but they had short fuses.
such a sudden coupling after the separation of husband and wife spoke of great need or great assurance. Anna had assumed it was the wall of dirt between Peter and his spouse that gave them the confidence to turn to each other so publicly. A wall of dirt on top of that same spouse would be just as reassuring and a whole lot more final.
Two tourists, twined together like unpruned ivy
What she had here was either a misunderstanding or an undiagnosed psychopath.
“I hate to pry—” “Hah!” “Okay. I like to pry. How about this: Why in God’s name did Peter think it was such a terrific idea to go on an expedition with his wife and his girlfriend and his ex-girlfriend?” “The ex is no big deal,” Zeddie said. “That was years ago. Frieda and Peter were friends. Shoot, Frieda and I were friends. With the notable exception of the Boil, I’ve always liked Pete’s taste in women.”
“It does sound kinky when you put it like that. I was going through a bad time. Peter wanted to be with me. The sentiment was mutual.
the story had the mundane ring of truth
Secret lovers seldom fool anyone but themselves. The discipline of an Olivier is required to lie with body language over a protracted period. There’s too much to control: looks, gestures, position, voice. Women are especially adept at reading the signs. When a husband and a younger woman are involved, the senses become preternaturally acute.
The knowledge that bombs could fall, stock markets crash, and hemlines go up again, and none of it could touch her.
To the list of classic choices—rock and a hard place, devil and the deep blue sea—she added abyss and wormhole. Minutes after dawn in a world that grew increasingly unimaginable with each slithered mile
Curt drank noisily, his elbow jostling her each time he hoisted his water bottle. Close quarters foment love or war. “Nudge me one more time and you’re meat for cave crickets.”
Neither money nor marriage rings her chimes.
“Of course you’re not conservative. You have nothing to conserve.” Zeddie was still at an age at which “security” and “tedium” were synonyms.
“Hi, Sondra. Everybody’s been missing you,” Curt lied without a hitch.
Cavers the world over dreamed of, lived for, risked their lives in search of a room such as this. And she, a dirt-detesting claustrophobe, had found it. The fates have a wicked sense of humor.
They would not be sufficiently punished; drawing, quartering, and disemboweling were outlawed in New Mexico.
Anna opted for ambush. If one had to go down, it was cleaner to go down fighting than whimpering in the dark.
a natural husbandman. He took care of things: cars, cats, people, and did it in such a way it went unnoticed and unsung.
Discomfort and suspicions would not be enough to start a mutiny. Not where there was a crazy woman to be looked after.
Scuttling backward with her prize, like an alligator with a Pekinese
Leftover pride from watching Westerns as a child: die standing up. She wished she had her boots on.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
June 16, 2019
With each book I read in this series, I get more and more hooked! THe last 30-40 pages of this book had my heart pounding and me biting my nails! I love this series!
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