Track of the Cat

really enjoyed it! Great character and there was astute observation and philosophy sprinkled in. I wanted more of an ending though.

A friend of mine was reading this, and because there's a cat, I got interested. I read a couple of 1 star reviews and I'm a bit... irritated.

But, before that, there are some delicious morsels in the writing. Like this one:

Thursday night the moon rose full and round at 9:12 p.m. Anna was waiting for it. The light came first, a faint silvery glow on the bottom of the few ragged clouds left from the afternoon's fruitless thunderheads. Then a dome, slightly flattened, pushing up into the saddle between El Capitan and Guadalupe Peak. Fainthearted stars faded from sight. Cool, colorless light poured down the park's western escarpment, rolled out like liquid silver across the ravine-torn desert to pool black under the spreading brambles of the mesquite and shine in the cholla needles.

Especially if you have read the whole book and found out the mountain lions were framed. It was a murder, by a human being, and the mountain lioness was killed for no reason, and her cubs starved to death for no reason, and if you have no tears for them, I think it's you who are the heartless b*tch, and not Anna Pigeon.

They didn't starve to death. Someone who found them first and took care of them.

One vulture, bolder than the rest, dropped down from the ledge on wide-spread wings, stirring up the putrid air. Unheralded, a Gary Larson cartoon flashed into Anna's brain. Vultures around a kill: “Ooooooweeeeee! This thing's been here a looooooooong time. Well, thank God for ketchup.”

Gagging, Anna turned and stumbled toward the pool. Razor thin lines of red appeared on her face and arms where the saw grass cut. Oblivious to their sting, she fought free of the vegetation.

“Karl had an audience. Pesky and Gideon looked on adoringly as the big man mucked out their shelter. Pesky kept nudging Karl's behind. Anna supposed he sometimes carried sugar or carrots in his hip pockets for the animals. The mules were not so easily won. They stood back by the manger, wary of Pesky's hooves, waiting for some serious food.

Under his breath, Karl was whistling, “We'll be quiet as a mouse and build a lovely little house for Wendy,” from Peter Pan.

Anna watched for half a minute. She figured she'd like Karl even if he did kill a ranger every now and again.”

BTW, Karl didn't kill anyone. He is a lovely person, a good and kind man, and Anna was correct in liking him. Now, Anna liked the murderer as well, until she found out they were the murderer. You didn't notice that? Too busy trying to find things to be petty about?

“As she slipped through the gate into the Maintenance Yard, her mind set on a little breaking and entering, Anna wondered if there were a crime she wouldn't commit under the right circumstances. Murder certainly. In fact she was keeping a list of Those Better Off Dead. If she were hungry she would steal. There were betrayals of the heart.
She'd never be cruel to an animal and she wouldn't litter.”

Nevertheless, Anna didn't kill anyone.

I know I read this book years ago, but wasn't sure until I picked it up again. This is the first Anna Pigeon novel. I wanted to go back to get a reminder of where Anna started. I love this author, and will be reading many others of hers I may have missed.

4.5 stars. THAT ENDING 🙌🙌🙌

I've just started reading as many mystery books as I can after years of limiting myself to sci-fi and fantasy. I've read some [a:Agatha Christie 123715 Agatha Christie http://photo.goodreads.com/authors/1190633574p2/123715.jpg], [a:Sue Grafton 9559 Sue Grafton http://photo.goodreads.com/authors/1202586126p2/9559.jpg], [a:Sara Paretsky 28509 Sara Paretsky http://photo.goodreads.com/authors/1231971056p2/28509.jpg], and a few others, and my overall thoughts on this book are very positive. I really enjoyed this mystery – Anna Pigeon is a very convincing city-girl gone solitary park ranger, and the setting of this particular book was fantastically described. I really felt like I was hiking with Anna. Nevada Barr throws in occasional quotable quote, too, which puts her above the Graftons and Paretskys I've read so far. The overall mystery was not obvious, but definitely guessable, and the message in the end was clear (and one that I support) against animal hunting.I'm sure my living in New Mexico right next to this park that is the setting of Track of the Cat helped me enjoy the vivid description. I'll have to wait until I read more to decide if Barr belongs with the same greatness that is [a:Tony Hillerman 26917 Tony Hillerman http://photo.goodreads.com/authors/1281729229p2/26917.jpg], but I'm pretty certain she does.