Note: Thank you to NetGalley, Minotaur Books, and author T. Jefferson Parker for the advanced reader copy of this book. This review will also be posted on NetGalley. What follows is my unbiased review of the book.

I don’t know if the author intends for Wild Instinct to be the first book in a series, or if it’s just a one-off with these characters. While I found the mystery to be a very well-written police procedural, the two main characters themselves didn’t resonate with me in a way that I would like to see more of them.

A body is found in Caspers Park, apparently mauled by a mountain lion. The Orange County Sheriff sends in Lew Gale, a former Marine sniper, to track the lion and kill it. Lew is not sure that’s the right thing to do, and his hesitation proves to be right. The autopsy reveals that Bennet Tarlow, one of the biggest developers in the area, was dead from a gunshot wound before the lion found him.

Lew is assigned to investigate the murder, along with fellow deputy Daniela Mendez. The two are quite different but end up working well together. Both are dealing with trouble in their personal lives as well, which bleeds over into the story.

As I said, I did enjoy the mystery. There were so many possibilities of who would want Bennet Tarlow dead. He was trying to develop an area near Caspers Park into a small city. The land was once inhabited by the Acjachemen tribe of Southern California, which is not recognized by the federal government. Lew also happens to be a member of that tribe. The investigation has him questioning his feelings about his heritage. He becomes involved with one of the protestors, who was initially a suspect.

Daniela, meanwhile, is struggling as a single mother of a teenage son. She’s worried about him getting involved with the local gangs and monitors his movements and communication with an app on his phone. Numerous times, she ducks out of the investigation to check on him. Is she right to be so worried? Throughout most of the book, I thought she might be overreacting. The background of this situation nearly made me DNF the book. Her son’s father is a priest who is much older than Daniela, but the two still seem to be in love. He won’t acknowledge his son, knowing that his career would be over. Daniela repeatedly talks about how she was a virgin until she met the priest, and thought about naming her son Jesus, but settled on Jessie instead. Really? This was a bit much to digest.

In the end, the mystery and Lew’s background were strong enough to keep me reading. I liked how he dealt with the conflict he faced about the land being developed and trying to find the murderer. I would have thought that he was too involved as a Native himself to lead the investigation, but he has integrity and a good sense of investigation. There isn’t much interaction with his superiors, which I would think would have been the case with such a high-profile investigation. I found the information about the tribe to be very interesting.

I rounded up to four stars, but I’d put it more at 3 1/2. The whole Daniela/Jessie storyline was hard to digest, but the rest was very well done, and I enjoyed Wild Instinct overall. The lion doesn’t factor into most of the story, except for the symbolism that Lew sees in it.