Book Review: Death in the Dark Woods by Annelise Ryan

The independently wealthy Morgan Carter runs a shop featuring books and curiosities in Door County, Wisconsin, but her real calling is far more intriguing, both to the idly curious and to those who, like a certain famed fictional FBI agent, want to believe:

I didn’t hide the fact that I was a cryptozoologist available for hire, but I didn’t advertise it either. Cryptozoology attracts its share of nutjobs simply by its nature. Add in all the con men like Baumann who are looking to make a buck off naive, vulnerable people, and you have the perfect recipe for a conspiracy hullabaloo. My parents were the reason I was drawn to the field. They had traveled far and often while I was growing up, dragging me along with them, hoping to find proof any of these intriguing, mysterious creatures existed. Any oddities they happened to come across along the way were just extras to help fill out the store shelves.

With degrees in both biology and zoology, Morgan approaches her work with a healthy skepticism, looking first for a reasonable explanation while leaving room for the possibility of the truly unknown. In this she’s ably assisted by the two other employees of Odds and Ends: computer whiz Devon Thibodeaux and retired librarian Rita Bosworth. When cases take her on the road, they provide support from home while looking after the store for her.

Morgan’s latest case is brought to her attention by Washington Island Chief of Police Jon Flanders, her slow-burn love interest. He’s been contacted by another member of law enforcement, Department of Natural Resources Warden Charlie Aberdeen, who’s investigating two suspicious deaths in the Chequamegon-Nicolet National Forest, several hours drive away. The sole witness to the first death claims that the dead man was attacked by Bigfoot. There were no witnesses to the second death, but the pattern of damage closely matches what happened to the first victim. More intriguingly, an oversized humanoid footprint was found near the second corpse.

The Bayfield sheriff’s department wants to quickly close the cases, writing them off as bear attacks. Bigfoot sightings are all well and good for the tourist trade, but Bigfoot murders are something else altogether. One of Morgan’s first tasks when she arrives is to eliminate for sure the possibility that the deaths were attributable to local wildlife. To her surprise, Charlie is more than ready to blow past this step, believing already in a cryptozoological answer. 

The more Morgan investigates, the more uneasy she gets about what’s going on in this seemingly bucolic area. With a host of people getting in the way of her scientific inquiries, perhaps the most surprising revelation she uncovers is one that the first unfortunate victim, a bow hunter, learns the hard way:

The animal was at his back waging a frenzied, relentless attack and, weakened from blood loss, Bodie fell to his knees and then onto his back in a last-ditch act of desperation. It didn’t work. The creature had incredible strength, and it flipped Bodie’s body over like he was a ragdoll.

 

Bodie’s mind took a strange detour then, his thoughts oddly calm and detached as he puzzled over the fact that he hadn’t seen his bolt anywhere in the creature’s body. Had he missed it, or had the animal pulled it out? Then he remembered how this creature had come from a different direction than where he’d shot.

 

Good God, is there more than one of them?

I love how Morgan meets all these questions with reason and intellect, and how well those qualities serve her when her own life comes into significant peril. Death in the Dark Woods isn’t just a well-built murder mystery: it’s also a terrific deep dive into the history of both Bigfoot and that particular forested stretch of Wisconsin. Some of the solutions did feel more obvious than others, but it was an absolute delight to go back and recontextualize what I’d read previously in the book once Morgan figured out its mysteries. With a little romance, a lot of atmosphere, and an utterly charming dog named Newt, this novel is a can’t miss for anyone with an interest in cryptozoology.