Book Review: Coyote Wind

Reviewed By: Woodstock - RAM

Coyote Wind     Amazon US PB Amazon Canada PB
Peter Bowen
Class/Genre:   Mystery
Series: Gabriel Du Pre # 1

Bowen is a new author to me - my attention was drawn to his books when he showed up on several "best of 2002" lists published late last year. I noticed that the first book in his Gabriel DuPre series was only 114 pages long, it could almost be described as a novella.

Bowen's point of view shifts from third person to first and back again regularly and frequently - sometimes two or three times in the same paragraph or group of phrases. He doesn't always use complete sentences. The result is a highly original and very compelling evocation of the style of speech used by the Metis people, originally living in French Canada who emigrated to the Northern plains of Montana and Canada in the 18th century.

Gabriel DuPre is a cattle brand inspector, occasionally called upon by local law enforcement to assist with one investigation or another. He is a widower, puzzled and overwhelmed at times by the task of being sole parent to his two daughters. He has a loving girl friend, plays the fiddle, enjoys a belt of whiskey, understands the pressures on the subsistence level ranchers in his community, and seems such a rich personality, he very nearly leaves the pages of the book.

In this introduction to the continuing series, DuPre climbs to a high mountain site of the crash of a small private plane at the request of the local sheriff. NTSB investigators arrive in a day or two, and they discover two complete skeletons, but only partial remains of a third body. In the quest to determine who the third dead person is, and what happened to all the remains, DuPre uncovers long buried secrets of one local family and also some difficult memories of his own.

Highly recommended - I will read more by him, for sure!

Woodstock - RAM

Reprinted with permission. Do Not repost without permission from the author, Woodstock - RAM