In Sunday’s New York Times Book Review, Marilyn Stasio declares, “Nobody knows the woods of Maine like the rugged individuals who eke out a living by hunting, fishing and cutting timber. And nobody knows the region’s inhabitants like Mike Bowditch, the young game warden in Paul Doiron’s manly mysteries set in this ‘desolate outland where game wardens were hated and oxycodone abuse was epidemic.'”
Read the rest of the review after the jump!Stasio continues her praise by saying:
Massacre Pond presents Bowditch with “the worst wildlife crime in Maine history” when 10 moose are slaughtered on the property of a philanthropist who intends to turn her 100,000 acres of prime land into a national park. The locals making a living from this ancient forest are no picturesque yokels: along with the serious woodsmen there are poachers, gun-traffickers and even the occasional pedophile — none of them inclined to yield their ground gracefully. Doiron makes shrewd use of the moose murders to address a larger issue: the standoff between avid environmentalists and the residents of an economically depressed region faced with losing their livelihood.
