Borderline

Nevada Barr sets her books in various National Parks in the United States and her sleuth, Anna Pigeon, is a kickass mature woman ranger. Ever since I read a copy of Blood Lure, which was set in the Glacier National Park I have been a fan. It maybe helps that I have visited quite a few of the parks where she has set her mysteries but I think anyone who likes a mystery with a strong female character would enjoy them.

In this book Anna is recovering from a stressful incident in the previous book, Winter Study, and she has come to Big Bend National Park in Texas to take a rafting trip with her husband, Paul, and four college students. It is supposed to be a few days of communing with nature, having fun and eating well but it quickly turns show more into another stressful outing. Their raft gets overturned and all their belongings are swept away. When one of their number goes to search the bank to see if anything can be saved she discovers a body in the water. It is an extremely pregnant Mexican woman and she is still alive. Anna and the rest pull her from the river, she gasps "Please save my baby." and dies. Anna performs a C-section and the infant girl is saved. When the guide climbs up the bank to try to get a signal on her satellite phone she is shot by someone above. It is up to Anna and Paul to get the rest of the young people and the baby up the bank and to help. This, of course, is an ordeal in itself.

I was astonished, given that this book was written in 2009, that one of the characters in the book is a politician who wants to build a wall to keep Mexican people from coming into the USA. I guess that idea has been circulating for longer than I thought. It certainly made the book seem very relevant to today's circumstances. show less

Having been disappointed by Nevada Barr's Winter Study, I was hoping that Borderline would put Nevada Barr back on my A list. Thankfully, this book was much better. Barr is best when Anna is in the wilderness fighting for her life or solving a mystery. The sections of the book where Anna and Paul are on the river trip are exciting and full of action. Although important for the climax, the subplot about the mayor and the security guard seemed slow and wordy. Nevada Barr is back on track and I'm looking forward to the next adventure of Anna Pigeon.

Still recovering from the nightmare at Isle Royale National Park, Anna is on leave and seeing a psychiatrist. She and her husband go on a float trip down the Rio Grande at Big Bend National Park with a guide and some college students. They find a pregnant woman caught in some vegetation, and while they are unable to save the woman, Anna performs an emergency C-section with her husband's pocket knife. They encounter a starving cow, and one of the college students insists they must rescue the cow. The guide is shot, and the person doing the shooting seems to be targeting their party when a second member is shot. With the river rising and the loss of their raft, they must try to climb (with a baby in arms), but it puts them in danger. They show more don't know who they can and cannot trust. The book was written sometime after 9/11 made it more difficult for Mexicans to enter the United States. Barbara Rosenblat does a good job narrating the story. show less

Borderline, the 15th instalment of its series, opens with Anna Pigeon, a Ranger with the US National Parks Service, suffering from post traumatic stress disorder due to an incident in which she killed someone. As part of her self-prescribed treatment she and her husband Paul take a rafting trek down the Rio Grande in Big Bend National Park, Texas. Their tour group, four college students and a guide in addition to the couple, stumble upon a near-dead pregnant woman who, they think, was probably crossing the river from Mexico so her baby could be born in America.

Happily I was not disappointed in my search for a book with a strong sense of place. The physical grandeur of the Rio Grande and its surroundings is quite spectacularly brought to show more life by Barr and I felt as if I was travelling in the raft, staring up at the canyon walls and keeping a wary eye out for flash floods. But the book also has a wider sense of its location on the border between the US and Mexico: a place of racial tension where the politics surrounding illegal immigration into the US is most keenly observed. Although the book did take a side on this hot button political issue it did so sensitively and as a natural part of the story which I found a refreshing change from being preached at which has happened several times in my recent reading.

The other aspect of Borderline I found quite captivating was the depth of the characterisations. I knew nothing about Anna Pigeon heading into the story but I felt enough information was provided to give me a sense of her history. The depiction of her coming to terms with the shooting incident, her status as a ‘mere’ woman rather than a ranger, her relatively new marriage after many years of independence and her decision never to have children were played out against the backdrop of danger and adventure that Pigeon seems to thrive on. Another self-aware character was Darden White, the 63-year-old head of security for the Mayor of Huston who is in the Park to announce her run for Governor of Texas. White queries his own abilities as he ages as well as his devotion to the Mayor, who he used to babysit when she was a child, and Even the teenage ,products of the Barney generation, are quite thoroughly fleshed out and easily become people I wanted to read more about.

My one slight disappointment with the book is that in parts there was only a cursory attention to plot, especially in the second half which takes place after the rafting group leaves the river. It is revealed rather clumsily that the pregnant woman in the river was the victim of a crime but ultimately the culprit reveals themselves rather than being uncovered through any sleuthing, professional or otherwise, and the ending includes a disappointing thriller-style car chase that is at odds with the sensitivity shown earlier.

Overall though I enjoyed meeting Anna Pigeon and loved spending a few hours in a spectacular part of the world I have not (yet) visited. To top it off Barbara Rosenblat’s narration was delightful, capturing the wry, slightly cynical tone that perfectly matched the picture of Pigeon depicted in the story told from her point of view. show less

Book 15 of Anna Pigeon. Takes place on the Rio Grande and a park right next to the border. Anna is on a recreational rafting trip with her partner and they find the body of a pregnant woman, almost dead, in the river. Problem solving during rafting was great. Description of how to maneuver when caring for others was also interesting to read about. Didn't really vibe with the backstory that created the villain. Thought her descriptions of the psychology of many of the characters, including other rafters, rangers, and security personnel, were great. Skimmed a little when the PoV switched to anyone other than Anna b/c wasn't as motivated/interested.

This book picks up after a horrific experience on Wolf Isle, in the last book, and starts off with Anna experiencing PTSD from that episode in her life. It had left me, as a reader, pretty raw, too, so was glad to have the opportunity to work through some of that mayhem. It also gave Anna and new husband, Paul, (a character I really like), an actual opportunity to be in the same location. That a rafting adventure quickly turns into its own disaster was not exactly the vacation Anna and Paul had been looking for, but did allow for growth and healing in its own weird way. Good characters, interesting to see Anna's views on infants, some political awareness of situations at the US/MExico border, and enough smarmy characters to keep a show more reader occupied. show less

Anna and husband Paul find themselves in Big Bend National Park - on vacation. This is the first park in the series that Anna has stayed as a "civilian", not a park ranger. She is still recovering from traumatic events that took place on Isle Royale in Michigan.

But of course it isn't all fun and games.

While Anna and Paul join a group on a raft trip on the Rio Grande, a member of the group finds a young, pregnant woman caught in some branches in the water. The woman appears to be dead but shows small signs of life. Anna puts on her ranger persona to try to save her. The woman dies but Anna takes a chance on saving the baby by performing a rough cesarean section with a pocket knife.

Initially it appears that the woman was trying to cross show more the river from Mexico, to have her baby in the U.S. But Anna questions this assumption, based on the woman's appearance and the location along the river.

When Anna tries to figure out who the woman is she is stymied at every turn. Worse, she finds herself in danger. We have harrowing escapes here, with heart-stopping moments.

While I enjoyed the story, I found some aspects peculiar. I wondered how it was that a rescue team did not take both Anna and the baby to a hospital, and why Anna was permitted to hold onto the child after the rescue, rather than surrender it to authorities. A reason is given later, that the child protection agencies can't get there until later in the week, but that seems pretty weak.

We didn't get to explore as much of the park as I had hoped. One of the attractions of this series for me is that we get to glimpse activities or locations that are often closed to the public.

Despite these objections, I did enjoy the book. I will miss Anna when I run out of her! show less