Returning to her new and larger office in Bozeman, Montana from a successful surveillance, Private Investigator Cassie Dowell is perplexed as she notices the light is on, despite it being after hours. She resists calling the police, despite having been a former law enforcement investigator herself, as she has had her own share of encounters with them that did not go as planned.

Finding no damage and vowing to get the locks, she grabs her “Sir Scott’s Treasure” file and heads home to dinner with her teenage son Ben and her mother Isobel who lives with them. Settling down after dinner to do some work, Cassie ponders the poem again that was left on a restaurant’s whiteboard overnight that provides clues to a huge fortune in gold coins.

Not that middle-aged Cassie had any interest in searching for the treasure, quite the opposite in fact!  In a strange twist, she has been hired to find the man who hid the gold as he wants to make sure he was as careful as possible in not giving too many clues.   Will Cassie be up to the task to gain the terrific fee he promises if she can find the treasure hider?

While "the treasure state" has long been a familiar nickname for Montana due to its richness in minerals and mines, TREASURE STATE is the aptly named title for the sixth and latest novel in his very popular Cassie Dewell series.

I have read quite a few of the books in this series and really enjoy Cassie as a lead character.  She has gained quite a bit of wisdom from the school of hard knocks, and as typical for her age, a few pounds on the waistline and the need to wear reading glasses for both the fine and larger print.  While still taking chances, Cassie has also learned the hard way that she needs to be careful and resourceful in doing the investigation work she loves.

This is particularly important in the second major case Cassie takes on.  Sympathetic to a call from Candyce Fly, a previously wealthy widow in Baco Grande, Florida, whose fortune was sucked dry by a charming and handsome con man, Cassie agrees to look for him as well as the missing PI  (J.D. Spengler) who stopped reporting in to Candyce on his investigation of the same man. Yet, would her careful plans put her and her family at risk?

One of the things, I particularly enjoyed in TREASURE STATE is how skillfully CJ Box integrates characters or situations from his previous novels (such as the Lizard King, her work intern and the young treasure hunter) which is a plus for fans; yet, new fans can equally relish TREASURE STATE as a fully stand-alone novel. Box also makes his writing very suspenseful by integrating several foreshadowing scenes and the reader suspects things are going to happen, but definitely not how or when!

 Whether you are already a long-time fan of CJ BOX or just love a perplexing and enthralling mystery, I heartily and fully recommend TREASURE STATE!  While tough and scary at times, you will definitely enjoy being hot on the trail in the beauty of Montana with Cassie with her various means of gaining treasure and results! Enjoy!

Book Summary