This book is beautifully written. It makes me want to go to Yellowstone even more! Very highly recommend this book

I picked this book from Netgalley as I had been hoping there would be a lot of factual information about Yelllowstone to create a really powerful backstop to to the story here. Up to a point there was: there are nice descriptions of the park as it looks at different times of the year and times of day. The problems of protecting the wild animals there from poachers is touched upon. The seasonal work of the caterers has a ring of authenticity. But perhaps most mystically of all, Yellowstone as the grandaddy of all volcanoes is the gateway to the occasional big Satanist rite and the good guys need to put a stop to it.
The writer is a therapist who apparently has seen enough of the sordid side of human nature to want to convey a message of spiritual redemption to his readers. I am not sure that he goes the right way about it. The action begins with Joan, the rookie ranger with something to prove. All goes as well as might be expected until her past tracks her down and catches up with her with rape in mind, after which it seems that her destiny is not to be a ranger after all. Nope, it is back to Kinder, Kuche and Kirche for Joan, as good and godly boyfriend comes to the rescue. The future of the the family resulting from earlier events is also threatened, as dark forces are now after their child.
The bad guys start off taking the child delinquent psychopathic route of killing and torturing animals, before adopting a fairly unpleasant social Darwinist ethos where murder is used to keep its followers obedient.
None of any of this to my mind promotes the message that a strong heroine might be capable of making her own choices, as there action then turns to the detective work of the men in the story.
The action is well paced, this novel does not bore, but it did all seem fairly 70's somehow. I do not particularly care for the message it seems to be propagating regarding women's roles, which does seem very reactionary. That, it has to be said, was ultimately quite a turnoff, at least for me.