Skinwalkers

Skinwalkers is a crime novel by American writer Tony Hillerman, the seventh in the Joe Leaphorn/Jim Chee Navajo Tribal Police series, published in 1986. The film version, Skinwalkers, was adapted for television for the PBS Mystery! series in 2002. Plot summary Murders are happening all over the huge reservation, and Lt. Leaphorn can see no pattern. Then, someone makes an attempt on Jim Chee's life, and the two work together for the first time to solve these crimes. The novel won two awards, the 1988 Anthony Award for Best Novel and the 1987 Spur Award for Best Western Novel. Reviews at the time of publication praised it highly: "Hillerman brings together his two series characters--middle-aged, cynical Lieut. Joe Leaphorn and young, mystical Officer Jim Chee--without in any way diminishing the stark power and somber integrity that have distinguished previous exploits of the Navajo Tribal Police." The writing is "lively and extremely descriptive" and author Hillerman was "a master of character, scene, and plot". A New York Times review called this the breakout novel for Hillerman, when sales began to surge and recognition increased. Plot Jim Chee wakes from restless sleep about 2:30 am, hearing the cat enter through the cat door into his trailer. When Chee is out of bed, three shotgun blasts come through the trailer wall over his bed, tearing apart his mattress instead of him. In daylight, he finds where a vehicle leaking oil had parked in the night and the footprints of a small person. This is added to the list of unsolved homicides facing Lt. Joe Leaphorn, who asks that Chee be assigned full-time to aid him in solving the homicides of Irma Onesalt, Dugai Endocheeney, and Wilson Sam, and to find who shot at Chee. Captain Largo agrees.