C.J. Box – Wyoming  Writer

The latest thriller novel from C.J. Box hit bookshelves January 6. Box says, “This is a very dark story, very dark.”  The book is set in Denver, Colorado, a departure for Box. Three Weeks to Say Goodbye takes the reader through a heart-wrenching tale  – a sinister struggle between adoptive parents and teenager birth father and grandfather, a powerful, intimidating Federal judge. Real events involving friends of Box form the basis of the story.

Seven Joe Pickett books demonstrate Box’s ability to build suspenseful plots. Pickett is a Wyoming Game Warden pitted against evil and violence. Box has crafted a protagonist with strength and sensitivity – not an easy task. I love Box’s ability to create a very real sense of place, skillfully transcending imagination to reality. As I’ve read the Pickett series there’s often that “ah-ha” moment of knowing I’ve been in exactly that location, whether it’s a lonely Wyoming back road or a steaming Yellowstone fumarole. A gentleman at the book signing tonight commented to a friend, “When I read his books I want to get in the car and drive to Wyoming.”

Box’s last stand-alone novel, Blue Heaven, was a New York Times bestseller. Retired LA cops and missing children in the woods of Northern Idaho – the spellbinding story has been optioned for a film. Blue Heaven has recently been released in paperback.

After initial signings in Cheyenne and Laramie, Wyoming, Box came to Denver to introduce Three Weeks to Say Goodbye. A Western book swing will take him through Texas, Arizona, California, Montana and Wyoming. We saw him at Murder By the Book on South Pearl in Denver before he appeared at Tattered Cover. Guess what my next read will be.