Rating: 
Summary: A Good Old Fashioned Mystery
Review: Park ranger Anna Pigeon has been sent to Glacier National Park to be a part of the Bear DNA Project. The adventure begins when the researcher's camp is destroyed in the middle of the night by a bear. Elsewhere in the park a woman is found dead. Anna fires up her little gray cells to fit all the pieces of the puzzle together. Following the clues in this mystery is like watching a drama behind a filmy curtain. You think you know what is going on, but you can't be sure until the curtain is finally removed. As always, Barr's talent for describing landscapes brings the reader right into the story's setting. Even if you've never been in a wilderness, you are bound to feel a connection here. A few errors in punctuation and sentence structure, mentioned by another reviewer, are troublesome at times. But these errors are easily forgiven because the story is just so very entertaining.
Rating:
Summary: A Better Barr
Review: Park Ranger Anna Pigeon is back in a recent offering from Nevada Barr entitled Blood Lure. Like the previous two novels in the series, this one is short on plot and long on character development and scenic descriptions. This latest adventure finds Anna on temporary loan from her assigned duty station on the Natchez Trace Parkway to the Waterton-Glacier International Peace Park. Anna is thrilled to leave her patrol car back home and instead of traveling on the macadam asphalt, to be wandering the mountains once again. She has been assigned to assist with The Greater Glacier Bear DNA Project, which is designed through the use of special equipment, to collect various samples from passing bears in the high country of the park. The samples will be used to identify each bear individually, obtain an accurate count, and for other information. Anna joins a team that will work far above the tundra in one specific area of the park. Things begin to rapidly deteriorate as the camp is attacked in the night by a bear. One researcher is discovered missing and as search parties fan out, a dead body is quickly found. The cause of death is quickly established to be human, and since the park is already short staffed, Anna is reassigned to finding the killer. Her search takes her repeatedly across the scenic high vistas of the park in an almost solitary quest. The scenery and her actions are described in great detail as she slowly zeros in on the killer in a rather surprising ending. While this is by no means the best Nevada Barr can deliver, Blood Lure is certainly an improvement over her last two books, Deep South and Liberty Falling. Less neurotic and introspective, and more prone to action, it reminds me a bit of the thrills in her first Anna pigeon novel, Track Of The Cat. I hope that she is back on track and will soon work her way back to the performances of her early books in this series.
Rating: 
Summary: nice scenery...silly mystery
Review: Park ranger/Law enforcer/sleuth Anna Pigeon is invited to Glacier National Park in Montana to help gather grizzly bear DNA for a research project. But when the researcher's camp is trashed and a hiker is found dead, it seems that perhaps nature, known to be cruel, is cold and calculating as well...or is it the work of a two-legged perpetrator instead?
Barr describes Glacier's monumental scenery with the knowlege of someone who has both been there and appreciated it fully. However, she does not seem as adept in her mystery story development. Obvious clues fly out at the reader (red-herrings are obvious, important clues seem emblazoned with neon lights), but unfortunately it takes Anna quite a bit longer to catch on. The denoument is waaaaay over the top, and was visible several miles away.
Rating:
Summary: Murder at Glacier National Park
Review: Ranger Anna Pigeon returns in another mystery set in a National Park. This time it's the beautiful Glacier National Park which is the setting of the book. Anna is sent from her post at Natchez Trace Parkway to participate in a DNA study of grizzly bears. She goes out with a ranger and a young Earthwatcher named Rory. Soon Rory disappears during an apparent bear attack and his step-mother who was camping nearby is found dead. Anna puzzles over the seemingly unrelated clues and considers each person in the area as a possible suspect. As always, the lovely background of the Park is described in wonderful detail by Barr. She does go into more detail than necessary on the "blood lure" which is used to attract the bears, but taken as a package, this book is intriguing and well-written. A reader can always pick up some information from Barr's book, such as the bear research in this one. Although the premise of the murder may be a bit farfetched, Barr does weave an intriguing tale which keeps the reader guessing until the very end.
Rating:
Summary: Blood Lure is a HUMAN mystery...
Review: The back cover reflects a bear problem, big bears, big problem, lots of scary stuff. OK, so one lady is the victim, and the whole book reflects the pursuit of her killer. No big bears that rampage the town, eat hikers, whatever, just a murder mystery. A good read, it's still just a murder. I wanted bears...LOTS of bears!! Personally, they scare me to death, and I wanted a bump-in-the-night thriller. I'll read more Nevada Barr, but be prepared.
Rating:
Summary: Good book, Bad editing
Review: The careless proofreading and sloppy editing of this book suggest a lack of respect by the publisher for its author and for the reader. The earlier reviewer who made this point is right on target. In addition to the many grammatical/proofreading mistakes, the editor has let slip far too many repetitious descriptions of the "blood lure" of the title. The author's intent may have been repetition for effect, but a failure of editing judgment leaves the reader feeling the need to shower and wash one's clothes. Barr's work deserves better and we, the readers, deserve better.
Rating: 
Summary: This book was lame...
Review: This book had all the nuance and insight of a poorly scripted comic book. Written from the perspective of an extremly anal, painfully politcally correct and smug female forest ranger. The male characters are all weak charactered and pathetic stereo types and lack any soul what so ever and the female characters are all treated as if they (particularly the main character Anna) are somehow superior to all the males around them as a rule. Macho female characters and weak, spineless male characters and terribly hard to swallow coincedences make this barely believable book a big fat flop. This book book seems like it was was written to appeal to women who hate men, and at the same time want to be one. This book deserves zero stars but there's no choice for that.
Rating:
Summary: Disappointing
Review: This book starts well, then implodes. As always, Barr plays to her strengths: the delightfully grouchy Anna Pigeon, a good cast of supporting players, and the backdrop of another of North America's great national parks: Glacier/Waterton. The bear DNA studies that form the heart of the story are real-after the book was published, in fact, they generated important new findings (such as the fact that the park may have twice as many bears as was previously believed).
What doesn't work well is the mystery. Partly, that reflects an old problem with this type of story: the reader knows there's murder afoot-otherwise there's no reason for the book-but Anna thinks she's on an assignment that has nothing to do with law enforcement. That means the reader is busy tabulating clues before Anna has any reason to recognize that anything odd is going on. But even when murder does occur, Barr chooses to blind her detective to the obvious identity of the murder weapon, even after practically rubbing the reader's nose in it. That's frustrating. Equally frustrating is the fact that the high-action finale is drained of much of its tension for those of us who've long ago figured out major pieces of what's going on. Barr's numerous fans (of which I'm one) will enjoy 95 percent of this book and shrug off the rest. Her finales are always hit and miss. Newcomers should start with "Blind Descent," which works much better on all levels. One other note: Barr should force her publisher to provide better maps. In a book in which half the action occurs by hiking north, south, east, or west, it is inexcusable to be given a map on which the top of the page is west.
Rating:
Summary: Fairytale Ending Puts an Added Spring in Anna's Step
Review: This is my first time reading Nevada Barr and hence my first introduction to her National Park ranger detective, Anna Pigeon. Anna's a tough old bird, forgive the pun, but it adequately describes a woman that has ridden a hellish emotional rollercoaster and now seeks the sanctity of Mother Nature in America's natural park preserves rather than deal with the predictable, shallow and disillusioning civilization.
Pigeon finds herself on loan in Glacier National Park, working with bear research expert Joan Rand, a motherly French Canadian who gets her kicks out of collecting bear DNA in the form of hair and scat while traipsing off-trail from one research planted bear lure to another. Joining them is Rory Van Sladt, a teenager with little desire or forestry experience other than his affiliation with a ecological preservation society--this most likely prompted by a desire to spruce up his college applications with prerequisite volunteer work.
When Rory's stepmother is found in the Park murdered and supposedly mauled by a bear, Anna's powers of perception kick in and amidst the backdrop of beautifully detailed descriptions of Glacier, she must pull every bit of information gleaned from her first day on the trail to a near death experience involving an extraordinary bear and her water bottle, in order to defend the benevolent character of her beloved natural sanctuary.
Anna's character, although funny at times, borders on the cynical for the majority of the story. Barr illustrates Pigeon's suspicious nature, her insensitivity and her definite non-maternal tendencies in scenes where she teases Rory unmercifully regarding his fear of bears, later during her interrogation of Rory and his father and throughout the novel as she ponders the ersatz worthlessness of modern life. But, Barr is apparently quite wise, and allows Anna a redemption of sorts when the story reaches its wonderfully magical climax in a setting fit for the best of fairytales. Happily, this bit of charm comes as a total surprise, for me perhaps because I had never read Barr before, for other veteran readers, it may be the norm in such exquisite settings.
I listened to an unabridged format of this story issued by Recorded Books--the preformer adequately brings to life the characters of Joan, Rory, and especially Anna. I recommend it for all who are intrigued by mysteries taking place within the National Park community and most certainly for all lovers of Nevada Barr's Anna Pigeon series.
Rating:
Summary: Fairytale Ending Puts an Added Spring in Anna's Step
Review: This is my first time reading Nevada Barr and hence my first introduction to her National Park ranger detective, Anna Pigeon. Anna's a tough old bird, forgive the pun, but it adequately describes a woman that has ridden a hellish emotional rollercoaster and now seeks the sanctity of Mother Nature in America's natural park preserves rather than deal with the predictable, shallow and disillusioning civilization.
Pigeon finds herself on loan in Glacier National Park, working with bear research expert Joan Rand, a motherly French Canadian who gets her kicks out of collecting bear DNA in the form of hair and scat while traipsing off-trail from one research planted bear lure to another. Joining them is Rory Van Sladt, a teenager with little desire or forestry experience other than his affiliation with a ecological preservation society--this most likely prompted by a desire to spruce up his college applications with prerequisite volunteer work.
When Rory's stepmother is found in the Park murdered and supposedly mauled by a bear, Anna's powers of perception kick in and amidst the backdrop of beautifully detailed descriptions of Glacier, she must pull every bit of information gleaned from her first day on the trail to a near death experience involving an extraordinary bear and her water bottle, in order to defend the benevolent character of her beloved natural sanctuary.
Anna's character, although funny at times, borders on the cynical for the majority of the story. Barr illustrates Pigeon's suspicious nature, her insensitivity and her definite non-maternal tendencies in scenes where she teases Rory unmercifully regarding his fear of bears, later during her interrogation of Rory and his father and throughout the novel as she ponders the ersatz worthlessness of modern life. But, Barr is apparently quite wise, and allows Anna a redemption of sorts when the story reaches its wonderfully magical climax in a setting fit for the best of fairytales. Happily, this bit of charm comes as a total surprise, for me perhaps because I had never read Barr before, for other veteran readers, it may be the norm in such exquisite settings.
I listened to an unabridged format of this story issued by Recorded Books--the preformer adequately brings to life the characters of Joan, Rory, and especially Anna. I recommend it for all who are intrigued by mysteries taking place within the National Park community and most certainly for all lovers of Nevada Barr's Anna Pigeon series.
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