My rating: 3 of 5 stars
Wolves howl as a riderless horse returns at sunset to the Culpepper Dude Ranch in the Madison Valley. The missing woman, Nanika Martinelli, is better known as the Fly Fishing Venus, a red-haired river guide who lures clients the way dry flies draw trout.
As Sheriff Martha Ettinger follows hoof tracks in the snow, she finds one of the men who has fallen under the temptress’s spell impaled on the antler tine of a giant bull elk, a kill that’s been claimed by a wolf pack. An accident? If not, is the killer human or animal? With painter, fly fisherman, and sometimes private detective Sean Stranahan’s help, Ettinger will follow clues that point to an animal rights group called the Clan of the Three-Clawed Wolf and to their svengali master, whose eyes blaze with pagan fire.
In their most dangerous adventure yet, Stranahan and Ettinger find themselves in the crossfire of wolf lovers, wolf haters, and a sister bent on revenge, and on the trail of an alpha male gone terribly wrong.
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I turned to the Sean Stranahan series when I ran out of Longmire books to read. I love reading modern western books and Sheriff Martha Ettinger has, together with Sean Sean Stranahan, become favorite characters of mine.
In this book is Martha Ettinger trying to find a woman that has gone missing. Nanika Martinelli, the missing woman's horse showed up without any rider and Martha follows the tracks in the snow, but instead of finding the woman does she stumble over a dead man impaled on the antler tine of a bull elk. And elk that seems to have been killed by wolves. Is this an accident or is it murder? Sean Stranahan, on the other hand, is contacted by the sister of Nanika Martinelli, to find Nanika. Could both cases, the missing woman, and the dead man, have some connections? But why would anyone want to kill the man and where is Nanika?
In this book is Martha Ettinger trying to find a woman that has gone missing. Nanika Martinelli, the missing woman's horse showed up without any rider and Martha follows the tracks in the snow, but instead of finding the woman does she stumble over a dead man impaled on the antler tine of a bull elk. And elk that seems to have been killed by wolves. Is this an accident or is it murder? Sean Stranahan, on the other hand, is contacted by the sister of Nanika Martinelli, to find Nanika. Could both cases, the missing woman, and the dead man, have some connections? But why would anyone want to kill the man and where is Nanika?
Dead Man's Fancy is a good book, not a favorite book of mine in this series, but I liked reading it. Sean and Martha have a lot of chemistry (right from the first book was that noticeable) and since I have read the book after this was I looking forward to reading about them taking their relationship to the next step.
However, this is not a romance novel, so it's not a dominant storyline. The murder case and the missing woman case are interesting. I did suspect the ending of the missing woman case. There were hints throughout the book that made me suspect things that were revealed at the end. Still, I found the ending good.
The pacing of the book was now and then a bit slow, too slow for my liking. Hence, the rating. However, I do recommend this series, and the next book in the series, Crazy Mountain is fabulous.
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