Land of Wolves

Walt Longmire comes home from a traumatic experience in Mexico to find a shepherd dead in circumstances that might be suicide, might be accident, and might be something connected to a Basque family with a reputation for removing the legs of sheriffs who cross them. The fifteenth Longmire novel is quieter than some entries, concerned as much with Walt's psychological recovery as with the mystery — and with a wolf in the Big Horn Mountains that the sheriff finds himself unexpectedly identifying with.

George Guidall continues to inhabit Walt with a naturalness that has deepened over fifteen books — his voice has become inseparable from the character for the large portion of the series' audience that discovered it through audio. The Basque cultural world, rendered with Johnson's characteristic care for the communities surrounding Durant, benefits from Guidall's vocal precision. At just over eight hours, Land of Wolves is a reflective and humane entry in one of crime fiction's most sustained achievements.