10-28-2007, 04:58 AM
Every couple of years, I go back to reading books by Burke and his New Orleans Detective Dave Robicheaux. Robicheux is an alcoholic cop in New iberia parish. The stories are pretty bleak and squalid but they are well written with lots of purple rose to give some sections a very lyrical feel. Plus, they give a really gritty look to the New Orleans underground. ( Not to be confused with the Dutch Underground of World War 2. Which is a completely different type of underground. Don't get me started on the London Underground)
I was particularly interested to read this book when I heard it took place in the aftermath of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. We kind of forget Rita, don't we? I figured if anybody had anything to say about the storm and it's aftermath it would be Burke. I wonder if there is going to be an Ann Rice Vampire Katrina story.
This story has multiple threads that all wend there way into being a single cloth by the end of the story. First there is the storm. Burke stays away from the stories we all kind of know. There's no talk of the Superdome. There's no talk of the disorganization of FEMA. But we do go into the 9th word. We talk about the looting and murdering.
We follow a group of looters as they rip off one of the kings of the underworld. These looters also were involved in raping a white teenager who happens to live across the street from the Underworld King. The looters also are on the run from a friend of Dave's Clete Purcel who wants them for skipping out on their bail. And there's a psychopathic killer who targets Dave and his family as he searches for the Blood Diamonds the looters found in the Underworld King's house.
I'm thinking Blood Diamonds and Al Queda come up because they were and are quite topical.
It's all very convoluted. People go from being the hunters to being the hunted. Purcel is always charging around like a drunken bull in a beignet shop. Everyone keeps saying what a great cop and standup guy Robicheaux is but they never say why they feel that way and he never acts in a way to merit these compliments.
It's typical Burke with cool Hurricane insights thrown in and great depictions of New Orleans underwater. Sometime the talk of Robicheaux and demons gets overbearing but the writing kind of makes up for it.
I was particularly interested to read this book when I heard it took place in the aftermath of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. We kind of forget Rita, don't we? I figured if anybody had anything to say about the storm and it's aftermath it would be Burke. I wonder if there is going to be an Ann Rice Vampire Katrina story.
This story has multiple threads that all wend there way into being a single cloth by the end of the story. First there is the storm. Burke stays away from the stories we all kind of know. There's no talk of the Superdome. There's no talk of the disorganization of FEMA. But we do go into the 9th word. We talk about the looting and murdering.
We follow a group of looters as they rip off one of the kings of the underworld. These looters also were involved in raping a white teenager who happens to live across the street from the Underworld King. The looters also are on the run from a friend of Dave's Clete Purcel who wants them for skipping out on their bail. And there's a psychopathic killer who targets Dave and his family as he searches for the Blood Diamonds the looters found in the Underworld King's house.
I'm thinking Blood Diamonds and Al Queda come up because they were and are quite topical.
It's all very convoluted. People go from being the hunters to being the hunted. Purcel is always charging around like a drunken bull in a beignet shop. Everyone keeps saying what a great cop and standup guy Robicheaux is but they never say why they feel that way and he never acts in a way to merit these compliments.
It's typical Burke with cool Hurricane insights thrown in and great depictions of New Orleans underwater. Sometime the talk of Robicheaux and demons gets overbearing but the writing kind of makes up for it.
So much for the flickr badge idea. Dammit