Open Season

Three point five stars for the first book in C.J. Box's Joe Picket series.
The main protagonist, Joe Picket, is a game warden assigned to the Twelve Sleep area in Wyoming. When he finds a body on a wood pile in his back yard, Joe gets involved in a murder investigation even though neither the local sheriff nor his own bureau want him to help. The investigation soon turns up two more murders. The supposed killer is soon found and the case closed. However, Joe isn't satisfied. When he finds a connection to the attempted extinction of an endangered species, he continues the investigation on his on. This proves dangerous for both Joe and his family.
The story seemed fairly predictable for much of the book. However, Box rescued the story by putting a nice twist and some thrilling action in the last part of the book.
In the end I found that I quite like Joe Picket the game warden and somewhat unwilling detective. I will continue the series.

(The Penguin eBook version I read has a formatting problem. It has a link to other books inserted after chapter 37. That seems to indicate that the story is finished, but it isn't actually the end of the book. You need to scroll past the link page and read the epilogue that closes out the story. Bad Penguin, bad.)