Ren Hopper is a Yellowstone enforcement ranger with lots of heroic
skills and lots of regrets. He couldn’t
prevent his wife’s suicide nor his mother’s alcoholism, and he may have ruined
the life of a grieving young man. The
main villain here, though, and the object of Ren’s constant ire, is humanity in
general, who largely have no respect for wild animals. They are either hunting them for their pelts
or putting themselves in danger for a photo op with a predator. Ren does what he can to rescue these latter
foolish ones, despite wishing he could just leave them to a grisly fate, but
the poachers are a threat to animals of both the two-legged and four-legged
variety. Heller’s
The Guide is a better thriller, but this book has more heart and
soul, as Ren has to consider the motivations of hunters and vandals before he
throws the book at them. He also has to
outsmart them by being one step ahead of them, and that’s sometimes a tall
order. The author may wax eloquent a
little too often about the natural beauty of Montana, but these moments of
serenity are an occasional respite from the many emergencies Ren has to
address. However, it’s Ren’s vacillation
between compassion and rage that makes his story so gripping.
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