It is thrilling to witness a writer of a noted series extend the range of his storytelling and offer more nuanced characterization.

Maine author Paul Doiron has established Maine Game Warden Mike Bowditch as a beloved staple in the literary canon of the state. Bowditch is a good and decent guy, someone with a streak of independence, if not rebellion, who bends department protocol to consistently break cases, often to the chagrin of his supervisors and other law enforcement personnel.

Bowditch managed to earn a promotion a couple of books back, stepping up to become an investigator for Maine Warden Service, giving him more authority and range in the Maine woods. His career advancement has upped Doiron’s game as well. The plots that engage Bowditch are richer, as is the investigator’s character, exhibited through deeper self-reflection and more self-deprecating humor.

“Dead Man’s Wake” involves a fatal boating accident and a young woman who was strangulated and tossed into the lake. These two incidents fall under the overlapping jurisdictions of both the Warden Service and Maine State Police. The complex plot elevates the story from being simply another Bowditch mystery to crossing solidly into the genre of “police procedural,” where the gathering of evidence and the confusing, fuzzy lines of conflicting jurisdiction are paramount in intensifying tension.

The story opens on Golden Pond at a small family party to celebrate Mike’s engagement to Stacey Stevens at his stepfather’s retreat, with Stacey’s parents, Charley and Ora Stevens, in attendance. Stacey has been Mike’s on-again/off-again love throughout the Bowditch series. Stacey is a state biologist and ace float plane pilot like her father and, in “Dead Man’s Wake,” provides Mike with invaluable insights and an ex-officio partner. Her father, a retired regional game warden, has been Mike’s friend and mentor for years. From the dock the night of the party, Mike and Stacey watch a powerboat race through the dark, then hear it hit something “soft” before speeding away. When they go to investigate, taking Mike’s stepdad’s pontoon boat to investigate, they find a severed arm.

Ever eager to be involved, Charley Stevens finds useful avenues to assist in the investigation. Rounding out the menagerie of officials involved are Mike’s former partner, Kathy Frost, who is called in with her cadaver dog, Maple, and Galen Webb, deputized as a Kennesaw County sheriff, appointed “lake constable” to police Golden Pond. He, too, is ever-eager to be useful, wanting to prove himself after having been passed over as a candidate to join the Warden Service because of skeletons in his past. The cast is largely completed with Detective Roger Finch, a state trooper who harbors grievances toward and a keen dislike of Bowditch.

“In each of our previous encounters,” Bowditch reflects, “I’d forced him to question the path he’d been pursuing. The detective was a man who hated to depart from a predetermined route even when presented with proof that he was headed in the wrong direction.”

The victim of the boat accident is Kipling Whitworth, a Massachusetts realtor whose wife’s family owns Mouse Island on the far side of the pond. Gina Randazza, the murder victim, is the wife of a violent leader of a local motorcycle gang. Whitworth and Randazza had rendezvoused at the island’s rustic camp for a drug-infused tryst. Detective Finch is immediately convinced that Whitcomb had murdered Randazza. Mike and Stacey aren’t so sure.

“Something happened that night that we’re not seeing,” Stacey tells her fiancé.

“You’re just going to ignore that he’s a dirtbag?” Finch challenges Bowditch.

Whitcomb had been involved in a tangle of trysts on Mouse Island, a behavior his wife tolerated since she had been diagnosed with multiple sclerosis two years prior and was no longer able to satisfy him, and had become notorious in the Belgrade Lakes region for his dalliances. Randazza’s husband is a natural suspect, along with the other cuckolded husbands. Though Mike’s jurisdiction is supposed to be limited to the boating accident, he and Stacey can’t be shaken from pursuing other leads in Randazza’s murder.

In addition to the thorny permutations of the investigation, Mike reveals a tender side, prompted by recognition of the dangers of his job, his deepening affection for Stacey and the compassion shown to him by his stepfather and his future in-laws.

“What did I owe the people who loved me?” he muses late in the story, revealing growing emotional maturity. A lot, he realizes.

In his acknowledgements, Doiron indirectly expounds on the maturity of his craft. “Somewhere along the line in (the story’s) composition, I began to realize that I needed to learn many things to tell the story that wanted to be told.” This included boat accident reconstruction and underwater criminal investigation, among others. He cites late Maine author E.B. White’s family for permission to quote from “Once More to the Lake,” White’s essay about Golden Pond, which adds a lovely emotional resonance early in the story.

Frank O Smith is a Maine writer whose novel, “Dream Singer” was a finalist for the Bellwether Prize, created by best-selling novelist Barbara Kingsolver “in support of a literature of social change.” Smith can be reached via his website: www.frankosmithstories.com.

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