Abandoned by Booklikes

So this is the 25th Lucas Davenport book I have read and it seems that we will see Davenport pursue something different. He once again is dealing with depression, but being asked to help find a young man that his daughter Letty met is enough to push that back for the time being. When it appears that Letty's friends may have come across a brutal group murdering Travelers, Lucas and others do what's necessary to take down the group.

"Gathering Prey" follows Lucas as he is dealing with depression setting in due to a murder case that looks to be shaping up to have the defendant get away with murder. Lucas is also starting to get annoyed with the bureaucracy at the Bureau of Criminal Apprehension. While this is going on, Letty, his daughter, runs across two Travelers (Skye and Henry) near her school. Letty ends up being herself (don't even ask) and then passes on her number to Skye to look her up if she ends up near Minnesota. When Henry goes missing, Skye hears rumors that he may have been killed by a group headed up by a man named Pilate. She reaches out to Letty who in turns helps Lucas investigate.

Lucas seems more mellow in this one. Though Letty being involved with the case doesn't thrill him or his wife Weather, he's become resigned to the fact that she's going to be in law enforcement someday. One good thing I thought about this book is that Letty finally realizes that she's not the biggest/baddest thing out there. Lucas wants her to learn to be cautious instead of impetuous all of the time. Lucas is also getting tired of the BCA and though he calls up his usual suspects (Flowers, Del, etc.) his heart doesn't seem to be much in things.

Letty gets more developed in this one. I maybe laughed at someone telling Letty she's not a sociopath. I feel like Sandford was responding to criticism this character was getting from a lot of readers. She definitely shows emotion in this one. 

I wish we had gotten more dialogue with Weather. She just seems to be there to off-screen lecture Letty and Lucas and or tell them to be careful, and talk to Lucas about Letty's future. Remember when Weather was a fully developed character that actually did things and interacted with people? 

We also get Pilate's POV and I wish that had been cut down some. 

The writing at times is pretty grim when describing that has been done to victims by this group led by Pilate. The flow was up and down. I started to get bored reading about Lucas driving all over rural America and then having to deal with locals and shootouts every five seconds. It started to get to be a bit much after a while. 

The setting of the book dealing with Travelers and how they get around and interact with others was interesting. Sandford even gets into the Jugaloos and I still don't get that whole thing. At all. 

The ending leaves Lucas on a new path.