I finally discovered James Lee Burke in 1990, some four books into his Dave Robicheaux series, when my favorite bookseller of all time put a copy of The Neon Rain in my hands and said "you have to take this one home with you." Thirty-four years later I've enjoyed almost forty of Burke's novels, including all twenty-four Robicheaux books, and I'm thrilled that Burke is still adding to the series. But the series addition I've been itching for for a while now is one featuring Clete Purcell, Dave's soulmate, and I finally got it.
Clete Purcell has shared most of his life's experiences with Dave Robicheaux. The two had each other's backs in Vietnam, then again as frustrated New Orleans Police Department cops, and have continued to watch over each other now that Dave is a sheriff's detective for New Iberia Parish and Clete is working as a New Iberia private detective. If one of them is in trouble, the other can be counted on to show up with guns blazing - and this time around, Clete is going to need all the firepower he can get.
Trouble has a way of finding people like Clete Purcell even if it has to find his Cadillac convertible first. Shortly after picking the Caddy up from a local car wash, Clete wakes up to find four thugs systematically taking the car apart. What they are looking for he hasn't a clue, but Clete does have a good idea about who might have stashed something in the car without his permission. Clete's grandniece died of a fentanyl overdose, and if there's anything he hates more than fentanyl, it's the people who deal it. So it's a red hot Clete Purcell who returns to the car wash to get some answers.
But it won't be that simple because before Clete even gets started a pretty young woman calling herself Clara Bow asks him to investigate her evil ex-husband. Clara pushes all the right buttons. She's exactly the type of woman Clete can never resist rescuing, even when it puts his own life in danger, so now things are certain to get a lot more complicated for Clete Purcell and Dave Robicheaux. If they don't figure this thing out quickly, it is not only Southwest Louisiana that's in trouble - the rest of the world will pay a heavy price.
James Lee Burke paints a dark picture when it comes to good vs. evil, and he pretty much always has. When it comes to portraying evilness, Burke doesn't blink - but he saves his best writing for flawed white knights like Clete and Dave. Burke believes that a few good men willing to stop evil in its tracks no matter the personal cost can impact the world for centuries to come. Dave Robicheaux and Clete Purcell are two of those good men.
Longtime readers of the Dave Robicheaux series will especially enjoy Clete because they get to experience Dave through the eyes of the man who knows him best. As powerful as this story is, I still could not help but chuckle when I realized that each of the men sees the other as the craziest and most dangerous of the pair. They both believe that the other has to be protected from himself and his urges - and both of them are correct. What a team.
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| James Lee Burke author photo |
That's some serious devotion to a series! Glad this one turned out to be such a good read. :D
ReplyDeleteBy this point, I know the two main characters so well that very little about them personally surprises me anymore. But seeing Dave, the main character, through the eyes of his best friend this way managed to put a special twist on the series that I hadn't expected. Burke is 87 years old now, and I can't even imagine writing something this intense at his age. He's a special talent.
DeleteHe really is! I hope I'm going that strong when I reach 87.
DeleteThis is a great age for the mystery series and it takes real talent for an author to keep the chemistry going between two characters throughout the series. And it sounds like with Dave and Clete James Lee Burke has done that.
ReplyDeleteHe really has, Kathy. By this point in the series, these two guys have no secrets and don't want to have any. Their loyalty to each other is as strong as between husband and wife.
DeleteI probably told you before that I read the first two books in this series and then stopped reading them. I am not motivated to go back to this series but I had considered reading some of the books about the Holland family.
ReplyDeleteI had already read the fourth novel in the series before going back to read the first three, and I wonder if that's the reason I kept coming back to him in those early years of reading him. I think it was about the fourth novel that Burke really hit his stride in the series because it seemed to me that his tone and style was more correctly paced from that one on. He would have had me hooked anyway just with the Robicheaux character because I share so much in common with Dave when it comes to background, age, geography, etc.
DeleteThe Holland books are good, too, but if you get into that series I advise making yourself some kind of a crude family tree to keep up with all the Holland branches. I've read most all of those, too, but my first love is still the Robicheaux series.
I have not read James Lee Burke in such a long time! I really think I should start over with the first few books just to reacquaint myself with the characters.
ReplyDeleteThis series really grew on me. At first I read it just because of the setting and the cultural background of Robicheaux's, but soon I was reading it for the characters and all those who came in and out of their lives, especially Dave's life. He's definitely one of the walking wounded. I plan to stop by New Iberia in late June during a road trip that I'm taking with a grandson up to Shiloh. Our time is going to be limited this year because he's working a full-time job now, but I think he'd enjoy seeing it.
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