Review of PURPLE CANE ROAD (audiobook) by guest blogger Star LawrenceAuthor, James Lee Burke, reader Nick Sullivan Are you a Dave Robicheaux fan? Dave is one of those rugged (but tortured, of course) ex-alcoholic cops so beloved in fiction—but in the hands of master storyteller James Lee Burke he always takes on an edge that surpasses his imitators.
In PURPLE CANE ROAD, Dave, a detective in New Iberia, Louisiana, after washing out of the New Orleans Police Department along with his sidekick Clete Purcell, is still living on the bayou with his wife Bootsy and adopted kid Alafair. As he sorts among the skells and lowlifes, he unearths several threads—twin sisters who might have been abused by and then murdered the state’s executioner, a politician who used to date his wife Bootsy, a black prostitute named Little Face, and of course (wait for it), a soft-spoken psycho hit man. The threads twine into skeins, the skeins into knots.
At the heart of this tangle is Dave’s late mother, casually described by a black pimp as a whore, which sets Dave off on the trail of who murdered her by drowning her in a mud puddle.
As always with Burke novels, the locale, Louisiana in this case, is at least the equal of any of the characters. Burke lovingly describes every sight and smell of nature down to the molecular level—the scent of fish spawning, cane fields laid parted like hair by wind and strobing in lightning strikes, the smell of testosterone on the sweat-crusted work clothes of men he meets.
Although many Burkes are read by Will Patton in a soft southern purr, this one is narrated by veteran reader Nick Sullivan, who does a pretty fine job also, especially with Purcell’s raspy growl and the lilting Cajun cadences.
If I had one criticism it would be the psycho killer hooking up with the daughter Alafair. Burke has played this card before. Leave the poor girl alone to go to the library in peace.
Star Lawrence is owner of the health humor site, Health’s Ass, http://healthsass.blogspot.com
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