Hunting Badger
In the Janwillem van de Wetering novel I just finished, the running joke is how all the various agencies and police departments trip over each other and interact; and it's also a running joke in this one: Tony Hillerman's Hunting Badger.
This is another fine entry in the Navajo Mystery series. The story was inspired by, and frequently refers to, the 1998 Dale Claxton killing and subsequent escape of the three perpetrators into the Four Corners landscape. This novel begins with a robbery and shootout, and the escape of the cop-killers. Then someone drops in on retired Joe Leaphorn to give him some anonymous information. Which Leaphorn can't pass on, because he'd have to tell where he got it.
Jim Chee, who is now broken up with Janet Pete, keeps coming into dangerous proximity to Bernadette Manuelito. Since he is no longer an Acting Lieutenant he can't hide behind his rank. I fear for him. I do.
I sometimes find the Hillerman plot twists to be excessive, to the point of unbelievability. This stays inside the lines, though, despite some interesting touches. All the turns are based on (or reminded me of) real cases.
These stories are about the characters, the culture, and the landscape. The plot is an excuse to explore those three. Hunting Badger is a fine example of that exercise. Recommended.
[On the grimace front, Hillerman was fairly restrained: 3 grimaces in the space of five pages, but the rest of the book is unencumbered by them.]
CBIP: Campus Sexpot, David Carkeet
Life of the Empress Josephine, anonymous (Cecil B. Hartley?)
The Inheritance of Loss, Kiran Desai
The Year's Best Science Fiction, Twenty-ninth Annual Collection, Gardner Dozois, ed.
The Monitor Boys, John V. Quarstein