Walt Longmire, Book 7

Of surprise to no one, including me, I enjoyed this book. I am very much enjoying Johnson's writing style, complete with historical references, literary quotes, and quick-witted responses.

This book was a bit different, in that the bad guys, well, were all bad guys. The actual deaths in this book were, well, righteous deaths, in self defense and by someone with intent to kill. There's one very major plot device that was entertainingly obvious, but acceptable, in the book. When I became aware of it early on, watching for the device to repeat itself made its appearance that more entertaining.

In this book, Walt nearly freezes to death. Again. You'd think that after nearly freezing to death saving the Cheyenne Nation the year before, he'd be less likely to put himself in the situation to do so again. But that's the thing about fictional characters: they can be larger than life, and survive.

And sometimes, you need someone larger than life to inspire you to do better in yours.

This, as all of the Longmire books, is highly recommended.

Related, at the end of the book is a list of character inspired books to read. I am uncertain if I'll read them all, but it's an interesting list:

• From Walt: The Grapes of Wrath, Les Miserables, To Kill A Mockinbird, Moby-Dick, The Ox-Bow Incident, A Tale of Two Cities, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, The Three Musketeers, Don Quixote, The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, anything by Anton Chekhov.
• From Henry: Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee, Cheyenne Autumn, War and Peace, The Things They Carried, Catch-22, The Sun Also Rises, The Blessing Way, Beyond Good and Evil, The Teachings of Don Juan, Heart of Darkness, The Human Comedy, The Art of War
• From Vic: Justine, Concrete Charlie, Medea, The Kama Sutra, Henry and June, The Onion Field, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, Zorba the Greek, Madame Bovary, Richie Ashburn's Phillies Trivia
• From Ruby: The Holy Bible (The New Testament), The Pilgrim's Progress, Inferno, Paradise Lost, My Antonia, The Scarlet Letter, Walden, Poems of Emily Dickinson, My Friend Flicka, Our Town
• From Dorothy: The Gastronomical Me, The French Chef Cookbook, Last Suppers: Famous Final Meals From Death Row, The Bonfire of Vanities, The Scarlet Pimpernel, Something Fresh, The Sound and The Fury, The Maltese Falcon, Pride and Prejudice, Brideshead Revisited.
• From Lucian: Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo, Band of Brothers, All Quiet On The Western Front, The Virginian, The Basque History of the World, Hondo, Sackett, The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, Bobby Fisher: My 60 Memorable Games, The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, Quartered Safe Out Here
• From Ferg: Riders of the Purple Sage, Kiss Me Deadly, Lonesome Dove, White Fang, A River Runs Through It, Kip Carey's Official Wyoming Fishing Guide

One reader additionally added: "I really like the postscript listing of these books, and I decided to try my hand at this game, looking for something to do with mountains, outdoors and great prose. And for titles not already mentioned by Johnson. Here's what I came up with: The Ice Palace (Tarjei Vesaas), The Book of Ebenezer le Page (G B Edwards), Butcher's Crossing (John Edward Williams), Trustee From the Toolroom (Nevil Shute), The Prince of Tides (Pat Conroy), High Fidelity (Nick Hornby), The Shipping News (Annie Proulx) (and "meh"), Far Far The Mountain Peak (John Masters), Himalaya Tigers (Fritz Rudolph), an Ansel Adams photo album"