Author: Nevada Barr
Published: 2000 by G.P. Putnam's Sons
Format: Hardcover, 340 pages
Genre: Mystery
Series: Anna Pigeon #8
First Sentence: The Rambler’s headlights caught a scrap of paper nailed to a tree, a handwritten sign: REPENT.
Blurb: Anna Pigeon finally gives in to her bureaucratic clock-and signs on for a promotion. Next thing she knows, she’s knee-deep in mud and Mississippi. Not exactly what she had in mind. Almost immediately, as the new district ranger on the Natchez Trace, Anna discovers the body of a young prom queen near a country cemetery, a sheet around her head, a noose around her neck. It’s a bizarre twist on a best-forgotten past of frightening racial undertones. As fast as the ever-encroaching kudzu vines of the region, the roots of this story run deep-and threaten to suffocate anyone in the way, including Anna. (Penguin Random House)
My Opinion: The book was sluggish and was missing the usual dry humor between Anna and Molly. Then add in the dark history of the south and the good old boys refusing to let a woman tell them what to do, and you end up with my least favorite book in the series. In the past, Nevada Barr has been able to bring out the beauty of the park she is working. Not this time. I found nothing but dark hatred that never sat well with me.
If I was a fan of recommending books to skip in a series -- this would be it. Unfortunately, for people like myself who need to read a series in order and not miss a single chapter, you will have to work your way through and hope that Anna, Piedmont, and Taco, will make it to another park, in a more hospitable place, in more or less, one piece.
Blurb: Anna Pigeon finally gives in to her bureaucratic clock-and signs on for a promotion. Next thing she knows, she’s knee-deep in mud and Mississippi. Not exactly what she had in mind. Almost immediately, as the new district ranger on the Natchez Trace, Anna discovers the body of a young prom queen near a country cemetery, a sheet around her head, a noose around her neck. It’s a bizarre twist on a best-forgotten past of frightening racial undertones. As fast as the ever-encroaching kudzu vines of the region, the roots of this story run deep-and threaten to suffocate anyone in the way, including Anna. (Penguin Random House)
My Opinion: The book was sluggish and was missing the usual dry humor between Anna and Molly. Then add in the dark history of the south and the good old boys refusing to let a woman tell them what to do, and you end up with my least favorite book in the series. In the past, Nevada Barr has been able to bring out the beauty of the park she is working. Not this time. I found nothing but dark hatred that never sat well with me.
If I was a fan of recommending books to skip in a series -- this would be it. Unfortunately, for people like myself who need to read a series in order and not miss a single chapter, you will have to work your way through and hope that Anna, Piedmont, and Taco, will make it to another park, in a more hospitable place, in more or less, one piece.
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