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Review of Pamela Beason’s Berkley Prime Crime Mystery, ENDANGERED

Review of Pamela Beason’s Berkley Prime Crime Mystery, ENDANGERED

Endangered, the first mystery in Pamela Beason’s absorbing new series released in December 2011 by Berkley Prime Crime, focuses on the female Indiana Jonesesque protagonist Summer “Sam” Westin whose high-tech freelance job allows her to combine her love for photography and wildlife biology. But when Sam returns to a national park in Utah to do a story on the family of cougars she helped rehabilitate and a three-year-old boy disappears, Sam’s story quickly loses precedence as she and FBI Agent Chase Perez scour the rocky canyons for clues that the child, Zachary Fischer, is still alive.

As the hours pass into days and no trace of the boy is found besides his red tennis shoe and toy truck, the media latches onto the theory proposed by Sam Westin’s high-profile news anchor boyfriend that the rehabilitated cougars might be responsible for Zachary’s disappearance and death. Tensions soar as hunters illegally descend upon the park to dispose of the cougars — forcing the park rangers to choose between their continued search for the child and their maintenance of campground safety — and a ransom note is sent to Zachary Fischer’s parents demanding fifty grand. Although the FBI captures the two high school boys the same night they pick up the ransom money, the mystery escalates as the boys reveal that they were to receive a cut of the money from a shaggy-haired man whose description closely resembles the missing boy’s father.

Frustrated by the media’s hasty conclusions and her own plethora of dead-end clues, Sam Westin decides to take the boy’s disappearance into her own hands by journeying into Utah’s rugged high country completely alone–that is, until handsome FBI Agent Chase Perez destroys her solitude and her focus by choosing to accompany her.

From Sam and Chase’s moonlit hike across Rainbow Bridge, a tight-walker strip of limestone that spans the width of the canyon, to their rappelling into a crevice where “bands of pastel-colored rock rippled down like flowing curtains,” Beason draws upon her own experiences as a private investigator and wilderness adventurer to conjure forth Coyote Charlie — a free-spirited vagabond who roams the cliff sides and howls up at the night sky along with the coyotes — as vividly as the ancient ruins of The Anasazi:

The walls of the ruins were stacked sandstone, some still chinked with red mud mortar. A two-story town house stretched up to meet the limestone ceiling of the overhang. Tiger stripes of black desert varnish cascaded down from the arch above onto the buildings, furthering the illusion that the ruins were an overgrowth of the cliff.

Packed with as much poetic descriptions of nature as it is with suspense, Pamela Beason’s Endangered is a fast-paced mystery sure to leave readers in awe of the wilderness even as they peer into its tangled undergrowth, searching for either the cougar or kidnapper’s glowing eyes.

To read more about Pamela Beason, click here.

To order Endangered, click here.

To visit with Pamela on Twitter, click here.

Comments

  • This sounds like a very cool book — complete with lots of wildlife which I love! I am doubly intrigued because one of my WIPs is a mystery and the other is set in a natural-setting environment. Thanks for telling me about a great book I may not have heard of!

    December 12, 2011
  • ENDANGERED was a fast, very entertaining read, Julia, and I felt like I learned a whole lot about geography and wildlife at the same time! Hope you enjoy it, too. (By the way, your WIP sounds equally exciting!)

    December 12, 2011
  • Great review, Jolina. Thanks for sharing it. This sounds like a great book that I might not have otherwise picked up or considered. But it's going on my to-read list right now. 🙂

    December 12, 2011
  • Glad you enjoyed the review, Jessica. I wouldn't normally gravitate toward this genre myself, but Pam has really changed my mind when it comes to mystery series.

    December 13, 2011
  • Great review, Jolina. That cover is RIVETING (esp. to us gals who live among mountain lions)!

    December 13, 2011
  • PS – sorry… hasty initial comment. As you know of my complete adoration of mountain lions, I was 'hooked' (and dismayed) at the thought of “disposing of the cougars” – which is precisely what we do in society, unfortunately. I hope there is somewhat of a good outcome for the big cats in this novel, which sounds fascinating. Thanks, again, for the heads up and lovely review!

    December 13, 2011
  • Hi Melissa, Jessica, Julia! Nice to e-meet you! I want you all to know that although I have to put my characters through all sorts of trauma along the way (after all, there'd be no suspense without it), I am always writing toward a (mostly) happy ending for animals and people alike. I hope you get the chance to try out Endangered, the first book in my new series.

    And thanks, Jolina, for writing such a great review!

    December 13, 2011
  • Exactly what Pam said, Melissa. She ups the ante with the endangerment of the cougars, yet everything is beautifully done without being too “Pollyanna-ish” an ending.

    Enjoy! 🙂

    December 14, 2011
  • You're welcome, Pam. Glad to do it!

    December 14, 2011
  • How interesting. I love stumbling upon reviews of things outside my typical genres. It sounds like a good story. I also love to start series. I like knowing I have more to look forward to.

    December 18, 2011
  • I love a good mystery Jolina. Thanks for telling us about this one, which sounds awesome. And for not giving away the mystery (which totally would have spoiled it!:-)

    December 19, 2011
  • I agree, Sarah–it is always fun to dive into a new genre or series. Hope you enjoy! 🙂

    December 19, 2011
  • I'm so glad I didn't give the mystery away, Cynthia. I really despise spoilers!

    December 19, 2011
  • Oooh, sounds interesting! Thanks for sharing the great review! 🙂

    December 19, 2011

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