Purple Cane Road
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Amazon.co.uk Review
Purple Cane Road is proof positive that James Lee Burke is considerably more than a dispenser of tough and atmospheric detective yarns. His central character, Dave Robicheaux, is more than just a powerful addition to a prestigious series. We are dealing here with a stylist of the first order: a writer who has managed to seamlessly marry the hard-boiled idiom of Chandler with the atmosphere and literary elegance of William Faulkner.
Robicheaux is here plunged into his most painful and personal odyssey yet. He learns that his mother, Mae, was a prostitute who ended up drowned in a mud puddle by crooked cops in the pay of the Mob. As Dave and his partner Clete Purcell investigate, they encounter State Governor Belmont Pugh, a fundamentalist preacher; the terrifying Remeta, a super-intelligent hit man, and, most significantly, Jim Gable, owner of the mansion in Purple Cane Road, who knows more about Dave's wife then Dave himself.
As Robicheaux struggles through a morass of intrigue and double-dealing, he finds that coming to terms with his own troubled past becomes as important as identifying the his mother's killers. Burke's strategy is to subtly subvert the standard detective narrative, creating a seamy panoply of the darker side of American society. Alongside the customary imperatives of bloody violence and dangerous sexuality, Burke is able to address such issues as the growing chasm between black and white and the inequalities that have riven American society. He is a storyteller of prodigious ability and his use of language remains nonpareil:
I returned to New Orleans and my problems with pari-mutuel windows and a dark-haired, milk-skinned wife from Martinique who went home with men from the Garden District while I was passed out in a house boat on Lake Pontchartrain, the downdraft of US Army helicopters flattening a plain of elephant grass in my dreams.--Barry Forshaw --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Review
'The best in the Detective Dave Robicheaux series.' (THE INDEPENDENT )
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
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First Sentence
YEARS AGO, IN STATE documents, Vachel Carmouche was always referred to as the electrician, never as the executioner. Read the first page
Front Cover | Copyright | Excerpt
YEARS AGO, IN STATE documents, Vachel Carmouche was always referred to as the electrician, never as the executioner. Read the first page
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
James Lee Burke's first major disappointment,
By A Customer
This review is from: Purple Cane Road (Mass Market Paperback)
I've been reading JLB for 5 years now. I started with The Neon Rain, have read all the Robicheaux books and almost everything else. Most of the books have grabbed me and transported me to Louisiana, Montana, Texas or wherever. The stories have grabbed me by the throat and don't let go until the final page. The sense of place that JLB conveys is such that I can almost smell the Gulf. However I have a major problem with Purple Cane Road which is that I cannot accept the basic premise that Dave Robicheaux, despite his lost years as a drunk, has never once heard a rumour that his mother was murdered. Or that Clete hasn't heard anything even if Dave hasn't, especially as so many other people in the novel seem to be informed of the story, whether or not they have the full story. To me it defies belief that more than 30 years can pass without the slightest hint reaching his ears. Also in the reminicences about his childhood there seems to be a big hole in the plot in that his half brother Jimmie never gets mentioned, even in passing. In The Neon Rain we are told Jimmie is 15 months Dave's junior "... we did everything together. We washed bottles..., plucked chickens..., set pins at the bowling alley..". They were apparently inseparable. Yet not a word in Purple Cain Road. I'm looking forward to the next Robicheaux novel and just hoping that this was a temporary glitch until normal service is resumed.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
"I know you murdered my mother. I know the words she spoke just before you and your partner killed her.",
By
This review is from: Purple Cane Road (Dave Robicheaux Mysteries) (Hardcover)
This agonized accusation reveals some of the previously unknown trauma in the life of Dave Robicheaux, detective with the New Iberia Police Department, outside New Orleans. Robicheaux is a Vietnam War veteran with the emotional scars to prove it, an alcoholic who has finally beaten his addiction, and a fierce believer in justice, even if achieving justice means taking shortcuts. Dave's mother was murdered when he was a young boy, after she ran off and fell upon hard times in New Orleans. Some people report that she lived as a prostitute, but Dave has only good memories. He believes that she was murdered by two cops in the pay of the Giacano crime family, an issue which brings his present life into the picture, since his wife Bootsie is the widow of Ralph Giacano.
In one of his most emotional and personally affecting novels, James Lee Burke traces Robicheaux's search for information about his mother, her killers, and the reasons for her death. He is also, however, dealing with several other issues, some of which begin to overlap with the past. He is sympathetic to the case of Letty Labiche, a young woman on death row for killing a man who subjected her to constant molestation from the age of twelve, and Robicheaux blames himself, to some degree, for suspecting the molestation and ignoring it. As the days tick down toward Letty's execution, Robicheaux is hoping to find something that exculpates her. That search leads him, ironically, to discover information about his mother. As usual, Robicheaux is dealing with crooked politicians and law officers, problems which have not changed since his mother's death more than thirty years before, with some of the same people involved in both her death and in recent crimes. When Johnny Remeta, an attractive hit man, begins to ingratiate himself with Robicheaux's sixteen-year-old daughter Alafair, who is attracted to what she sees as his charm and sensitivity, Robicheaux goes ballistic, determined to protect Alafair and to determine who is paying Remeta. Although there is a great deal of violence in this episode in Robicheaux's life, both by others and by Robicheaux himself, Robicheaux manages (barely) to hang on to his sobriety and to avoid criminal charges for his violence. As the various plot lines converge and lead to a blockbuster conclusion, many aspects of Robicheaux's life come together, and many long-time predators meet their ends. More emotionally satisfying than some other Robicheaux novels because the violence is less gratuitous, Purple Cane Road combines issues from Dave's past with issues from his present, and suggests issues with which Robicheaux will have to deal for the rest of his life. A fine mystery executed with Burke's customary panache. n Mary Whipple The Tin Roof Blowdown (Dave Robicheaux Mysteries) Black Cherry Blues In Electric Mist With Confederate Dead: "In the Electric Mist with Confederate Dead", "Cadillac Jukebox", "Sunset Limited" Last Car to Elysian Fields: A Novel (Dave Robicheaux Mysteries)
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Cajun Classic,
By
This review is from: Purple Cane Road (Mass Market Paperback)
Read enough off the crime shelves and things get predictable. The authors you return to are those that add the atmosphere, the characters and the style. Burke has an interesting detective with baggage and an amusing side-kick. He has the usual omnipotent threat and a decent plot but the overwhelming joy, is the Southern flavour, with dialogue that has voices warbling poetically, in the head. Fabulous entertainment.
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