Almost Midnight

Mike Bowditch #13
Almost Midnight (2019)

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Almost Midnight begins with Maine warden investigator Mike Bowditch being pulled in two directions at once. One thread starts when his old friend Billy Cronk, a convicted murderer, asks for help investigating a new prison guard with a suspicious past. The other begins when Mike takes an interest in the shooting of one of Maine’s last wild wolves, a case that at first seems separate but gradually points toward something larger and more dangerous. As violence escalates, Mike starts to see that both matters may be connected to a broader criminal conspiracy.

What makes the premise especially strong is the way Paul Doiron combines the series’ familiar wilderness and game-warden elements with a prison-linked mystery that feels more urban, hidden, and politically messy than some earlier Bowditch cases. Mike is forced to balance loyalty, suspicion, and the risk that helping one person may expose others he cares about to retaliation. Almost Midnight keeps the series rooted in Maine while widening its sense of danger, turning what begins as two troubling investigations into a tense story about predators, cover-ups, and how far Mike will go to protect the people in his orbit.