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81 of 85 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
James Lee Burke Does Cormac McCarthy..., August 4, 2009
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And, for the most part, succeeds. If Burke doesn't twist and torture and then so beautifully reassemble passages in McCarthy's unique version of the English language, he is certainly no rookie when it comes to spinning his own brand of moody, atmospheric prose never too far a field from Faulkner's steamy bayous and weighty themes - but decidedly more readable. In the spellbinding "Rain Gods", Burke moves west from Louisiana's delta and Dave Robicheaux's perpetual but lovable gloom to a Texas southern border town where Korean War veteran Hackberry Holland is sheriff. "Hack" stumbles upon the shallow churchyard grave of nine illegal alien women, setting off a deliciously convoluted mystery/thriller featuring a rich field - rich even by Burke's lofty standards - of characters ranging from the mildly flawed to the unrepentantly deranged. Like Robicheaux, Sheriff Holland is haunted by ghosts from his past - hefting a trunk full of baggage that carries the nightmares of North Korean POW camps, the guilt from days of alcoholism and debauchery, and sorrow over the loss of his second wife. Holland pursues his own brand of justice battling these internal demons as well as a host of those in real flesh and blood - from the serial-killing psycho "Preacher" to three-letter government agencies not afraid to sacrifice the mostly innocent to bag the bigger game. Like McCarthy's "No Country For Old Men", "Rain Gods" deals with the drug trade across the border, and like "No Country", it is brutal, violent, and realistic. Burke, always the champion of the poor working class and never afraid to proselytize, lays it on thick here, though without Bush in the White House to cast as the villain, the targets of his righteous but sincere venom is a bit confused. Where McCarthy wraps "No Country" around simple, apolitical despair, Burke shades "Rain Gods" with a heavy hand of morality. But it works. Hackberry is a complex but likable protagonist - the stoic and troubled loner cast perfectly for the Clint Eastwood of "Gran Torino" - with a Texas accent. Hack's deputy Pam Tibbs adds color and sexual tension, and Iraq War vet Pete Flores and his talented girlfriend Vikki Gaddis make credible fugitives. But most fascinating is the almost mystical "preacher", a complex and unpredictable villain, already an urban legend among those who pursue him on both sides of the border. In the final analysis, despite some minor flaws, this is a powerful novel - entertaining while sobering, beautifully written, the uncommon and intelligent page-turner one would expect from James Lee Burke, who is without any doubt is back in full "Jolie Blon's Bounce" or "Last Car to Elysian Fields"-form. Hackberry Holland will no doubt fill pages of subsequent Burke novels, which I'll be anxiously awaiting. Well done, Mr. Burke, and good to have you back.
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33 of 35 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Thou Shalt Not Put False Gods Before Me, August 28, 2009
There is much to admire and lots to like in the writing of James Lee Burke. At its best, his prose can be poetic and evocative. When he doesn't descend to favorite tropes (for example, "pardners" and "swinging dicks") or let himself slip over the perilous edge of metaphor ("[he] ate a pattern of buckshot as wide as his hand and watched his brains splatter across the side panel of his truck"), he uses the language well and is a pleasure to read. If I have a criticism, and I do, it's that he leaves his stories ragged. Too many characters are allowed to bow in, often for no seeming purpose, and subplots head off in their own directions like pets that have escaped their leashes. It sometimes seems that Mr. Burke just can't tame the writing beast that lives within him. Rain Gods is a case in point. There are three or four sets of bad guys when one or two would suffice. There are several layers of cops, at odds with one another. Another bunch of characters is groomed for unlikely heroism. Sadly, I really don't feel that I came to know and understand these people through the long course of the book. The novel suffers in comparison to Cormac McCarthy's No Country for Old Men, a comparison that is inescapable. Both novels are centered on an old-time Texas sheriff with a past he is trying in some way to live down. An innocent and his woman are fleeing pursuit by a single-minded avenger. Border traffickers litter the landscape with bodies. The bete noir of Rain Gods, a villain called Preacher Jack Collins, is one part McCarthy's Chugre and two parts Judge Holden from Blood Meridian. The story of both novels is one of moral entropy. But where Burke is expansive, McCarthy is spare. Where Burke ranges free, McCarthy is disciplined in both his scope and his language: if this isn't a mess, it'll do until one comes along. Why spin off a paragraph when ten words will suffice? This is not to say that Rain Gods is not worth reading. It is. But I wish it hadn't come in No Country's shadow, and I wish it had been pared down and more directed so that I had a better sense of just what its author was trying to say.
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31 of 33 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Eloquent, poignant, powerful..., July 25, 2009
Customer review from the Amazon Vine™ Program (What's this?)
I always look forward to a new book in James Lee Burke's Dave Robicheaux series each July. So I was a bit disappointed to discover that Rain Gods is not part of this series. But it didn't take me long to enjoy it--every bit as much as Robicheaux. In fact, I think it was a good change for him. Although it takes place in Texas, it's not part of his Billy Bob Holland series, either (although Holland plays a very small role in this book). The time is post-Katrina, and a number of displaced New Orleans crime figures find themselves relocated to Texas. These guys are into everything from drug smuggling and prostitution to murder for hire. Sheriff Hackberry Holland gets an anonymous phone call about nine Asian women buried in a mass grave. Hack has had a checkered history, battling the demons caused by his time in a Korean POW camp. After spending time as a lawyer, he finds himself as county sheriff later in life. That's not necessarily a bad thing. He is told that "you're stubborn as a cinder block." In Rain Gods, Hack tries to juggle a lot of balls. While Hack is trying to solve the crime, the FBI and ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) have their own agenda while a hit-man named Jack "Preacher" Collins is trying to kill anyone associated with the Asian mass-murder. Preacher is perhaps one of the most fearsome villains in fiction. Thinking himself the right hand of God, his code of ethics is chilling. Yet, he often does the right (and unpredictable) thing. It is intriguing to see him match wits with a number of characters, including Hack. As Hack says, "If certain things we do or witness don't leave a stone bruise on the soul, there's something wrong with our humanity." For my money, James Lee Burke is perhaps the most eloquent, articulate, poignant and powerful mystery writer being published today. Isaac Clawson, and ICE agent, lost his young daughter to a brutal crime. "Theologians claimed that anger was a cancer and that hatred was one of the seven deadly sins. They were wrong, Clawson thought. Anger was an elixir that cauterized sorrow and passivity and victimhood from the metabolism; it lit fires in the belly..." I came to admire Sheriff Holland and will definitely go back and read one of Burke's earlier works. I understand that Lay Down My Sword and Shield features Hack as a young lawyer. It will be interesting to see where both men (Holland and James Lee Burke) came from and how far they have traveled.
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