The Longmire Defense is Craig Johnson's nineteenth Walt Longmire novel, and I'm a bit sad that I've read all nineteen of them because now I'm going to have to wait most of another year to revisit Walt and his Absaroka County, Wyoming, sheriff's department again. That's the bad news, but there's lots of good news, too, because The Longmire Defense is exactly the Walt Longmire novel that series fans have been waiting for for a while now.
This time around Walt pretty much operates inside his home county. With no mountain blizzards or wilderness treks to deal with, all those great series side characters readers have grown to love become integral pieces of the investigation that Sheriff Longmire unexpectedly finds himself in the middle of. That means readers get to catch up with what's going on in the lives of Walt's best friend Bear, his daughter Cady, and his love interest/deputy Vic rather than just watching those characters pop in and out of the book a couple of times in what sometimes feel like cameo appearances.
Walt has been called out on a routine search for a tourist who has wandered off the road and gotten herself lost, but - thanks to Google Maps - this has happened so often lately that Walt knows exactly where to start looking for her. As expected, he locates the young woman (who doesn't appear to be particularly concerned that she's lost) rather quickly, but Walt also comes away with old rifle that has been hidden in a rock crevice since the late 1940s. The location of his find brings back old memories of a story Walt remembers his father telling him about "the first time he saw a man die," but a man as curious as Walt Longmire wants to know more.
Even after learning that the found rifle once belonged to his own grandfather, a man he greatly resents even to this day, Walt is determined to learn what really happened on the fateful day his father watched a man die for the first time. Walt can handle the ethics of honestly investigating his grandfather's potential involvement in the case; what he didn't bargain for was stirring up some very powerful people who are willing to kill today to cover up a murder that happened 75 years ago.
I'm calling The Longmire Defense a five-star book, but I understand that longtime fans of the books are much more likely to agree with me than those who read the novel as a standalone. Reading a series is all about becoming comfortable with its setting and its recurring characters. After a reader, over several novels, achieves that level of familiarity, the books perhaps become more about the characters and their development than about plotting. That's where I am with the Longmire books...and I have to tell you that the last paragraph of the last page of The Longmire Defense just may be the best paragraph in the whole novel.
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| Craig Johnson jacket photo |
This sounds like such a good one! Makes me wish I'd started this series years ago so I could enjoy all the side characters and their story lines in this one. I just find starting a series that's already 19 books out a little intimidating.
ReplyDeleteI get it, Lark. I feel the same way about several that I've seen all you guys gushing about, and I've even sampled many of those. But I always do wonder if I'm enjoying them anywhere near the level that a longtime fan enjoys them...or if I even "get" the books. This one can certainly be read as a standalone...but with the same reservations I've mentioned.
DeleteI have only read three of these (the first three of course). I planned to continue reading them because I have the next three on my TBR somewhere. I remember liking his writing. So maybe I will get back to them.
ReplyDeleteFor me, Tracy, Craig Johnson is one of those writers whose work got better and better as he matured as a series writer. My only complaint about his novels is how some of the side characters seem to disappear from whole novels. That's understandable because Walt Longmire doesn't always stay "at home," and some of his investigations take him into the wilderness all alone for long stretches of a book. That's why I say that we as fans were overdue a novel like this one from Johnson. The whole gang gets a shot to make an impact in this one.
DeleteOh, I'll show this to Tom. He likes the books and tv show.
ReplyDeleteI really think he'll like this one, Nan. It's more straightforward than the last couple of Longmire books, and everyone is included this time.
DeleteIf you do, Terra, keep in mind that the first books are not the best ones in the series. Johnson hit his stride pretty early in the series, but it takes at least the first three, I think, to get a good feel for just how addictive this series turns out to be for most people.
ReplyDeleteLou Diamond Phillips is one of my favorite actors, too. I have to keep reminding myself that he's a Filipino-American actor and not Hispanic or Native American.