Borderline by Nevada Barr

I haven't read a Nevada Barr in ages - and this one has been sitting on my shelf for -- probably a couple of years, so there may be a couple more by now. Based on the list in the front of the book, I think I must have missed about six of them and there is one at the very beginning of the list that I don't remember - I thought Track of the Cat was the first one but there is one before it.

Back to this book. It certainly made me remember why I liked her books. Lots of action, beautifully discribed scenery - I wonder if she is going to run out of National Parks and have to branch out. Maybe not, according to the font of all knowledge, there are fifty-eight National Parks in the United States and another forty-three in Canada. So, even if she doesn't repeat herself, she could probably run this series as long as she wants to. It would take a little more research to find out if she has repeated any of them - I rather think not. The one before this one is set in Isle Royale, and I just read an article in Smithsonian about it: wolves and moose on a protected island habitat, could be interesting.

Oh, yes, this book --- it is set in Big Bend, and in the summer. Good choices. I have been reading too many frozen northern wasteland books: Minnesota, Colorado, Sweden, upstate New York ... Apparently, one can get just as dead down in Texas. And in this one Anna is married to her Mississippi sheriff and priest - must have happened in or between books that I missed. And in this one we have the singular experience of Anna caring for an infant - no, not her own - one of her rescues, like her dogs and cat - and she does find a home for it instead of having to take it home.

We begin with a rafting trip down the Rio Grande through the Big Bend country; US on one side, Mexico on the other. Then there is the flash flood, and the body in the river, and the rifleman on the cliff - classic Nevada Barr. Did I mention the crazy politician and associated henchmen? The word play in this title refers to the sometimes indistinct line between sanity and madness, with the primary reference, naturally, the US/Mexican border and the situations that were created by the abrupt closing of that border to casual commerce. Good bit of bloodshed, some seemed gratuitous, but all in all a good read.