Rating: 
Summary: One of His Best
Review: I have to recommend this book to Dave Robicheaux fans as one of the best; unlike the reader who felt Burke spent too much time on Dave's problems, I truly enjoyed living through Dave's latest troubles with him and found the story very moving. The language is exquisite, the atmosphere wonderful -- in my opinion, Burke doesn't get better than this. I do agree, though, that this shouldn't be the first book you read in the series -- start at the beginning and give yourself the full effect. I wait all year long for the next book to come out . . .
Rating: 
Summary: Good audio book Bad narrator
Review: I wish I had never listened to Mark Hammer read the book. I listened to two tapes and I couldn't take any more so I never finished the audio book. With Mark Hammer reading the book you can't tell one character from the next. Will Patton made each character alive and real. Hammer could put you to sleep. It's completely uninteresting. I'll go buy the book so the characters become alive again.
Rating:
Summary: Jolie Blon's Bounce
Review: This was a great book - except for the ending. I have noticed that the end of Burke's books is not consistent with the books themselves. He does not "build" to the ending, and therefore, the ending is a disappointment.
The main character in the book is a person called "Legion". He is 74 years old, but he gives Dave Robicheaux a fierce whipping and he shames him. Legion is one eerie character and Dave, surprisingly, is scared of him.
Two women are murdered (one after the other) and the primary
suspect is Tee Bobby Hulin, described as a "twenty-five year old black hustler..." One of the murdered women is the daughter of a "button" man, Joe Zeroski, who comes to town with the murderous rage. Joe brings his gang to town, including his niece who has an relationship with Clete Purcell. Clete, in the meantime, has an affair with the woman who is Assistant District Attorney. Robicheaux, with the help of a partner, solves the mystery - but he cannot get Legion out of his mind.
James Lee Burke is a reflective person. His characters are often violent - but they show a surprising gentleness. I always enjoy Burke's books because they show me a side to him that I had not known.
Rating:
Summary: WILL PATTON IS SORELY MISSED !!!
Review: James Lee Burke hits another Home Run with Joilie Blon's Bounce, however the audiobook version falls far below par without the reading of Will Patton. Will Patton, in all the previous Dave Robicheaux audiobooks, has brought flesh and blood identities to all the characters with his unique ability to vocally create their individual voices. Mark Hammer reads in a droning monotone voice which fails to separate the principal characters, and quite frankly is effective only in either putting the listener to sleep or inspiring profound boredom. Between each Dave Robicheaux novel, I have always been anxious to read and hear what Cletus, Batist, the Sheriff, Bootsie, Alafair, and of course Dave are up to. I was so disappointed at not being able to hear all my old friends on the Jolie Blon's Bounce audiobook version.Will Patton is sorely missed, please bring him back and reissue Jolie Blon's Bounce with all the old gang's voices that we know and have come to cherish. The only redeeming feature of this current version is the preface read by James Lee Burke, and the recording of Jolie Blon. This feature should definitely become an addition to all future audiobooks.
Rating:
Summary: James Lee Burke - Painter as Wordsmith
Review: I have read and reread Burke's fiction for years. His ability to describe the settings of his novels is astonishing. He can make you smell the blooming flowers and the rotting bayous, hear the language, and picture the crime scenes. Burke's creation of evil, manifested in Legion, is as scary and compelling as the best gothic writers. This book is a battle between good and evil, with a mysterious homeless person eventually settling the score. I plan to read this book several more times: for the language, to better understand Robichioux, to let Burke paint pictures in my mind. Highly Recomended.
Rating:
Summary: Burke and Robicheaux are back!!
Review: The good news is that James Lee Burke is still writing some of the most lyrically beautiful prose in fiction today. The bad news is that, at least with this Robicheaux outing, he seems to have lost a little of his focus as a storyteller. The middle section of the book has Robicheaux so self absorbed in his own problems I couldn't quite remember what crime he was supposed to be investigating. Far too many characters with hidden secrets and agendas of their own weave in and out of the tale with such regularity that it becomes a little difficult to keep them all straight. While each of these characters are equally compelling they tend to keep the narrative from running on an even keel. As to Legion Guidry.... I'm still not quite sure what to make of him just yet. On the one hand he is indeed one of the most interesting and evil villains I've seen in a work of fiction for quite some time. On the other hand I kept thinking that maybe Dave should have rung up Buffy Summers and asked her and the rest of the gang to come to New Iberia and help him out with this one. The mixture of metaphysics and gritty crime story worked well for Burke with "In the Electric Mist With Confederate Dead" but I'm still not decided on this one just yet. In the end I have to say that if you are already a Burke fan, then by all means read this one. If you are new to Dave Robicheaux and his world I strongly suggest one of the earlier novels. I decided to give four stars to this one due to Burke's wonderful prose and his creation of such facsinating characters but I still think that the rambling mid section does not represent the author at his best.
Rating:
Summary: The Hits Just Keep Comin'
Review: They're all there--the heavy atmospherics, the weight of the past, the good man who finally explodes in a rush of violence, the larger-than-life but plausible antagonist, prime southern gothic and the foods of the bayou. I'd set it one position behind what for me is now Burke's masterpiece, PURPLE CANE ROAD, because the plot meanders a bit in the second act, but it's a very close second and the bar which Burke has set remains out of reach for all but a handful of contemporary writers. Ladies and Gentlemen, this IS the state of the art.
Rating:
Summary: Where is Will Patton?
Review: Previous Burke audiobooks have been greatly enhanced by the reading of Will Patton who has established a distinctive audio identity for Dave Robicheaux, an authentic local narrative style as well as unique audio identities for the other characters. Although Burke's writing is as great as ever, the reading by Mark Hammer is not. Mark has just two voices, one white and one black, used for all characters, and he makes Dave sound as if he has aged twenty years between books. What a shame! I recommend reading, rather than listening, unless Will Patton returns. One compensating feature is a preface read by James Lee Burke himself, together with the music for which the book is named.
Rating:
Summary: Louisiana Lawman
Review: As deptuty sheriff of New Iberia, Louisiana, Dave Robicheaux lives in the dark heart of the American swamplands. After years of being a drunk, a Vietnam vet with horrible memories of the war, and time spent as a homicide detective in New Orleans, which was once the murder capital of the United States, Robicheaux is innured to the inhumanity people can show toward each other. However, when two young women in the community are murdered and Robicheaux is victimized by a man that is truly the nastiest villain to come along in mystery fiction in years, the Louisiana lawman takes up the hunt with a grim vengeance burning in his heart. The distance that Robicheaux keeps himself at during most investigations is stolen from him by Legion Guidry, who seems to have climbed up from the deepest pits of Hell. One of the young women is innocent, a child of god-fearing parents who have never done anything wrong in their lives. The other young woman is a prostitute whose father is a Mafia hitman. While Robicheaux is motivated by guilt for not seeing Tee Bobby Hulin as the culprit in the first girl's murder and a need to see justice done for her parents, Joe Zeroski the Mafia hitman starts out on a campaign of retributions and scorched earth that promises violence that will draw in many more people. Legion Guidry hovers in the shadows around both murders, and Robicheaux becomes the greatest threat to the man. James Lee Burke is a master of the Southern Gothic crime novel. His descriptions of places, people and events roll from the tongue. His books are actually a pleasure to read aloud, if one is so inclined; and the audiobooks read by Will Payton are absolutely the best because Payton has a natural honeyed pecan Southern drawl. Burke maintains two series characters at present. Dave Robicheaux sheriffs New Iberia (PURPLE CANE ROAD, DIXIE CITY JAM, BLACK CHERRY BLUES), and Billy Bob Holland divides his lawyerly duties between Texas and Montana (BITTERROOT, HEARTWOOD, CIMARRON ROSE). Burke has also written several stand-alone novels (LAY DOWN MY SWORD AND SHIELD, HALF OF PARADISE, THE LOST GET-BACK BOOGIE, THE CONVICT, TO THE BRIGHT AND SHINING SEA, and TWO FOR TEXAS). His second Robicheaux books, HEAVEN'S PRISONERS, was made into a movie of the same name that starred Alec Baldwin. Every James Lee Burke novel is an exercise in emotion and description that sandwiches layers of internal moral investigation. Robicheaux exists as a man with a keen world view and a need to help clean up whatever injustice he can. In this novel, Robicheaux is shown as being capable of being the grandest hero around, while had the same time staving off impulses to be as bad in ways as the villains he pursues. The pacing of the novel is impeccable, keeping the reader hooked while developing other characters and suspects, and proving once more that no crime is created wholly in a vacuum. The dialogue bristles, funny and sad and hurtful all at the same time. Clete Purcell's own substory runs as a sharp counterpoint to everything that Robicheaux encounters and already has. The glimpses Burke provides into Louisiana of forty and fifty years ago is awesome, and provides the anchor for so many of the things that still go on in that part of the world. Louisiana has deep roots as far as the history of the United States goes, and not all of those roots are clean and untarnished. Still, they are part of what made those lives, that state, and this country what it is. Making mistakes, realizing those were mistakes, and building toward a better tomorrow remains a constant message in all of Burke's books. The friendships Burke distills into his characters on the pages are real, but so is the darkest evil he unveils, and that is probably the most unsettling aspect of his work. Sitting down with a new Burke novel is a lot like sitting down with an old friend with a new but not too dissimilar story to tell. Burke has definitely got another winner in JOLIE BLON'S BOUNCE. Only one aspect of the story got perhaps a shorter shrift than some readers may have wished for. Bootsie, Robicheaux's wife, and Alafair, his adopted daughter, have conversations and involvement with Robicheaux that help him tip the scales in his fight against the alcoholism that wars within him. The scenes were shorter than some readers will want, because both Robicheaux and Burke are deep family men with definite views. Many will wish for more of the family interaction. JOLIE BLON'S BOUNCE is a crackling good crime novel. Readers of Robert B. Parker, Robert Crais, Elmore Leonard will find the same deeply resonant male figure/protector here that the first two writers offer, plus a tour of the fractured and sometimes dark psyche of men who take on the violent burdens of others. In addition to the suspense and pacing, the view of the characters and their places in their world, Burke also offers up some of the best reading anywhere. The sentences flow and the descriptions sing.
Rating:
Summary: BURKE AT HIS BEST - A TERRIFIC READING
Review: With an introduction by the author and a sterling reading by stage/screen actor Mark Hammer, James Lee Burke launches his eleventh tale starring popular Cajun police detective Dave Robicheaux. Burke, who has been called "the Faulkner of crime fiction," more than proves his mettle with this spellbinder. Once more, the setting is New Iberia, Louisiana, and a beautiful young teenager is savagely raped and murdered. She's far too young to die, and the obvious suspect is far too obvious for Robicheaux. Fingers point to drug addicted musician Tee Bobby Hulin. But then another slain girl turns up; this time the victim is a prostitute and the daughter of a local Mafia henchman. Along the way the unthinkable happens - Robicheaux is brutally beaten by a man almost 75-years-old, Legion Guidry, the wickedest of the wicked bearing an apparent in with the supernatural. Legion is vile, unpredictable, a former plantation overseer who still sees people as chattel. Robicheaux is going mano a mano with a diabolical adversary, and he knows it. Burke keeps getting better and better; this is his best. - Gail Cooke
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