Customer Reviews

Blue Orleans

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Before Katrina tore up the levees and devastated New Orleans, it could have been called Blue Orleans, especially in the Calliope Housing Project. Murder and mayhem were noticably daily happenings. This day, when Dino is called out to investigate a murder, he walked down Common Street wondering "where is everybody?" When he turned on Baronne, he ran headlong with panicky people running here and yon in their quest for freedom. The 300 block of Baroone looked like Mardi Gras. A huge crowd was massed all the way to Union Street on both sides of the street.

He sees an elderly lady about 80 years old dressed in her pink chiffon gown with a short fur coat draped over her feeble shoulders watching as another victim of this hoodlum is at the door of the NOPSI building and another body hanging beneath the overhang of that same place. Usually, most of the action takes place late at night or in the early hours while the painted ladies of the night ply their trade. Dino seeks not to impinge on the terriroty of the gangs, as he wants to survive this day to find more bodies scattered around this sinful town. In downtown area, a berserk gum is rampaging throughout shooting at random. Nobody is safe. One bound corpse is discovered murdered execution-style, bullet to the brain.

He finds a witness who vanishes like a puff of smoke, like Haslam tends to do when he wants to avoid the public. This writer also penned GRIM REAPER soon after this one was published, and two short stories "Maria's Hand" and "Guilty of Dust and Sin." New Orleans is the perfect place to find sin in all the different ganglands and projects. Nowadays, a good many of those are living on the streets of Knoxville, which will soon become known as Sin City with all those liquor stores and drinkers swaying to and fro on the main street of town. The place will be overrun with the homeless and this mayhew Dino is familiar in his hometown will soon be in mine. It's a dirty shame for a rich mayor to allow the poor of New Orleans occupy and tear up the housing while the poor of this town is denied even to apply for the same. Blue Orleans is not for the blues, which was developed in Memphis. New Orleans is a jazz town, with some of the notables still hanging in and avoiding the water moccasins which have taken over the deserted part of town.

After visiting New Orleans I picked this book up and couldn't put it down! I look foward to reading the rest of Denoux's books!