As Snakebit: A Mike Bowditch Short
Mystery by Paul Doiron begins, a woman has called Maine Game Warden
Mike Bowditch to report that she saw a rattlesnake. She claims to have seen it
during her hike on Black Cat Mountain. Considering there have not been any
natural occurring rattlesnakes in Maine in decades as well as the fact she does
have pictures and refused to give her name or any other information and got
angry quickly, Mike Bowditch doesn’t believe her. He soon has an opportunity to
reconsider that thought when hours later he is awakened with news of the fact
that a teenager has been bit while attending a keg party in the nearby woods.
Something is going on and Bowditch is going to get to the bottom of it in this
novella.
The read also includes the first three chapters of the next book in the series, Dead Man’s Wake. Thanks to a NetGalley ARC, I have already read the book. My review will go live here on the publication date of June 27th.
As to the novella, this is a solidly
good read. Set in an earlier time of the series when Game Warden Mike Bowditch is
only 27 years old (“..take place in the weeks before KNIFE CREEK…” per the
author’s Facebook post
of May 26th), the tale is complicated, and moves forward at a fairly rapid
pace. For those of us long familiar with the series, it is an enjoyable read.
For those new to these books, Snakebit: A Mike Bowditch Short Mystery is
a good taste of why these reads are so good.
My eBook reading copy came by way of
purchase using funds in my Amazon Associate account as it appeared the staff of
the Dallas Public Library system had no intention of purchasing it for
citizens. I have no way of knowing if they changed their mind as a city-wide
ransomware attack took down all city systems back on May 3rd and
many are still down. That includes the library system so we still have no
access to the catalog, our accounts, and no ability to return books and other materials,
or get anything from our holds list. Mayor Johnson and the City of Dallas staff
have done an exceedingly poor job of keeping folks updated as to the status
of the situation. All we have been told is that it could be “weeks” before
things might be fixed.
Kevin R. Tipple ©2023
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1 comment:
This is another series I have been planning read for years, and the first book has been on my shelves for ten years.
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