Hell Is Empty

Starred review from April 25, 2011
At the start of Johnson's stellar seventh novel featuring Wyoming sheriff Walt Longmire (after Junkyard Dogs), Walt and his deputy, Santiago "Sancho" Saizarbitoria, are escorting a trio of convicts through the Bighorn Mountains to meet a convoy of federal agents and sheriffs from neighboring counties. They must determine who gets jurisdiction over a newly opened cold case: one of the convicts, Raynaud Shade, recently confessed to burying the body of a Native American boy, a relative of Walt's friend and spiritual guide, Virgil White Buffalo, in the mountains years earlier. When Shade, who's headed for death row in Utah, escapes and takes off into the wilderness with a blizzard threatening, Walt sets off alone on the killer's trail, despite Sancho's warnings that Shade is leading him into a trap. Soon Walt is past the point of no return as the snow and ice accumulate on a journey that evokes Dante's Inferno, the book Sancho is reading on the expedition.

May 15, 2011

For Wyoming Sheriff Walt Longmire (Junkyard Dogs, 2010, etc.), the pursuit of a vicious murderer through a killer ice storm in the Bighorn Mountains adds up to a cold day in hell.

Sly, elusive Raynaud Shade is a homicidal maniac and a lawman's nightmare. But at last he's been caught. The confessed slayer of a 7-year-old boy is on his way to the slammer, almost certainly for the rest of his bloodthirsty life. And he knows it. So Absaroka County Sheriff Longmire, who has him in his custody, is quite reasonably uneasy. Not only is Shade a textbook psychopath, profoundly remorseless, he's begun professing an affinity for Sheriff Walt, as if they were somehow partners in delusion, as if Walt, too, were "possessed by evil spirits" that forced him to kill on command. All of which is as unsettling to Walt as it is unavoidable, since the body of Owen White Buffalo, the dead boy in question, was discovered in Walt's jurisdiction. The transport van advances circumspectly toward its destination until, in the mind-blowing ferocity of a sudden mountain storm, the slippery Shade manages to escape. Now a complex game's afoot as lawman chases madman. Before it's played out, the Bighorns, icily nonjudgmental, will have had their way with Walt, narrowing the sanity gap.

Deft as always, but dearly missed from this stark, wintry tale is grizzled Walt's much younger lover, his feisty, tormenting, adorable girl of summer.

(COPYRIGHT (2011) KIRKUS REVIEWS/NIELSEN BUSINESS MEDIA, INC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.)

Starred review from April 1, 2011

Wyoming sheriff Walt Longmire sets out to recapture a group of escaped convicted murderers. Among them is Raynaud Shade, who confessed to murdering a young boy and burying his body in the Bighorn Mountains. The boy was the grandson of Virgil White Buffalo, a Crow Indian, introduced in Another Man's Moccasins. The mutual respect and admiration between Longmire and Virgil is crucial in this seventh installment of Johnson's series, as readers are taken on an electrifying and perilous manhunt through the Cloud Peak Wilderness area of Wyoming. A paperback edition of Dante's Inferno, a blizzard, a forest fire, and a colossal amount of mysticism all play central roles as the story unfurls. Is Sheriff Longmire losing his mind as he climbs higher toward Cloud Peak? Is Virgil really there beside him? What is really happening, and what about Virgil's prophecies concerning the future? VERDICT Series fans and readers who enjoy C.J. Box and other authors of Western mysteries will be enthralled by this electrifying and intense work; a triumph. [Ten-city author tour.]--Patricia Ann Owens, Illinois Eastern Community Colls., Mt. Carmel, IL

Copyright 2011 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

April 1, 2011
When a complicated prisoner transfer goes horribly wrong, Wyoming sheriff Walt Longmire finds himself chasing a psychopathic killer, who has both hostages and accomplices, through a massive spring snowstorm in the Bighorn Mountains. The story starts with a pitch-perfect piece of Johnsons trademark scene-setting and then roars off into the wilderness, hardly leaving readers time to catch their breaths. Bad guys and bad weather arent the only complications, though, as Longmire encounters dangerous wildlife, local residents, and a very surprising acquaintance from a previous case. The physical demands of the journey may strain some readers credulityLongmire is the definition of dogged, but hes far from physically fit. Others may miss the amiable pace and the sense of community and place of previous series installments. But in some ways, this reads like a book-length version of the haunting, harrowing final sequence of Johnsons outstanding debut, The Cold Dish (2005). And when it comes to bad weather, western lore, and a chilling hint of the supernatural, few writers write it better.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2011, American Library Association.)