Rating: 
Summary: Enjoyable!
Review: In Burning Angel, James Lee Burke once again takes you on a journey through the "Old South", the modern world and the intense inner life of Dave Robicheaux. James Lee Burke leads you not directly down one path, but rather through a maze of interconnecting stories that result in a rich tapestry of an experience.
Rating:
Summary: Thoroughly satisfying
Review: James Lee Burke is a master novelist whose prose is so good that I begin to notice how good it is, and that distracts me a little. But that's about the only quibble I have with it. Burke's dialogue is imaginatively vernacular and must be savored rather than skimmed, and his evocation of place is topnotch. All the characters are fully developed and human in a Faulknerian sort of way; i.e., their lives and actions are directed by their heritage and experiences in ways they cannot easily defy.
Rating:
Summary: Thoroughly satisfying
Review: James Lee Burke is a master novelist whose prose is so good that I begin to notice how good it is, and that distracts me a little. But that's about the only quibble I have with it. Burke's dialogue is imaginatively vernacular and must be savored rather than skimmed, and his evocation of place is topnotch. All the characters are fully developed and human in a Faulknerian sort of way; i.e., their lives and actions are directed by their heritage and experiences in ways they cannot easily defy.
Rating:
Summary: The real deal, mon
Review: James Lee Burke is one of America's finest mystery writers. Not only does he put together a good story populated by interesting (and sometimes upsetting) characters, he captures the true flavor of a unique region. I moved to Acadiana after having read the first few books in this series. I kept having a weird sense of deja vu as I travelled around Lafayette, New Iberia, and New Orleans. It finally dawned on me that I had read about some of these locations in Burke's books. Burke paints with words, giving a reader a sense of the taste, the smell, the sounds, the *feel* of south Louisiana. This is how the place is (although most folks experience a whole lot less violence in their lives). I strongly suggest that you read this series in chronological order. A little warning. While Burke never spares us a view of the more violent and vicious side of humanity, some of the books are particularly dark. I wonder if the darkest of the books were written at less happy points in his life. Burke will make you care about characters in the series, then do terrible things to them. These books are outstanding. Be prepared for a wild ride.
Rating:
Summary: The real deal, mon
Review: James Lee Burke is one of America's finest mystery writers. Not only does he put together a good story populated by interesting (and sometimes upsetting) characters, he captures the true flavor of a unique region. I moved to Acadiana after having read the first few books in this series. I kept having a weird sense of deja vu as I travelled around Lafayette, New Iberia, and New Orleans. It finally dawned on me that I had read about some of these locations in Burke's books. Burke paints with words, giving a reader a sense of the taste, the smell, the sounds, the *feel* of south Louisiana. This is how the place is (although most folks experience a whole lot less violence in their lives). I strongly suggest that you read this series in chronological order. A little warning. While Burke never spares us a view of the more violent and vicious side of humanity, some of the books are particularly dark. I wonder if the darkest of the books were written at less happy points in his life. Burke will make you care about characters in the series, then do terrible things to them. These books are outstanding. Be prepared for a wild ride.
Rating: 
Summary: BURKE HAS DONE BETTER!!!!
Review: Maybe it was just me but I never could really get into this book. This is the eighth Robicheaux I have read and in my openion one of the worst. I think there were to many people involved, you almost need a program to keep up with them. To many dreams by Dave. Who is the problem? Is it Sweet Pea Cahrisson, Sonny Boy Marsallus, Johnny Carp, Moleen Bertrand, Rufus Arceneauxn, Emile Pogue or John Giacano and this is not all the players. There are about three or four stories going on at the amse time also. Graves being dug up, people being put off their land, chemicals being destroyed. To many stories and to many people for an old person to keep up with. Sorry, Burke.
Rating: 
Summary: Burke on less-than-top form is still pretty splendid
Review: Not quite the best of the Robicheaux series - that would be either A Morning for Flamingos or A Stained White Radiance - but James Lee Burke's second-best books are still more powerful, more moving, and more vivid than most writers' first-best. As always with the saga of Dave "Streak" Robicheaux and the lowlife elements he encounters, Burke excels at character delineation and at conveying the phosphorescent, putrid atmosphere of Huey Long territory. Fans of Cletus "Noble Mon" Purcel - with his truly poetic capacity for invective - will be glad to know that he's back, as is the still dirtier-mouthed Helen Soileau, who unexpectedly reveals a vulnerable side here. Precious few living novelists can me buy their work purely on the strength of their name. Burke's one of the few.
Rating:
Summary: Burke on less-than-top form is still pretty splendid
Review: Not quite the best of the Robicheaux series - that would be either A MORNING FOR FLAMINGOs or A STAINED WHITE RADIANCE - but James Lee Burke's second-best books are still more powerful, more moving, and more vivid than most writers' first-best.
As always with the saga of Dave "Streak" Robicheaux and the lowlife elements he encounters, Burke excels at character delineation and at conveying the phosphorescent, putrid atmosphere of Huey Long territory. Fans of Cletus "Noble Mon" Purcel - with his truly poetic capacity for invective - will be glad to know that he's back, as is the still dirtier-mouthed Helen Soileau, who unexpectedly reveals a vulnerable side here.
Precious few living novelists can make me buy their work purely on the strength of their name. Burke's one of the few.
Rating:
Summary: Dave Robicheaux is the ultimate fallible hero
Review: Once again, Burke gives us the complete package; the honorable, battered, and stoic detective Dave Robicheaux, a man who has suffered the trials of Job, but refuses to compromise his stout moral code of ethics; an excellent mystery involving local secrets that threaten to defrock a socialite and kill the local woman he is rumored to be involved with; and the flavor of the Louisiana bayou country, with its unique Cajun culture as only Burke can describe it. Robicheaux runs into an old acquaintence, Sonny Boy Marsalis, who hints at involvement in the US government's shady, mysterious dealings in Central America. Apparently, CIA-connected people want Sonny dead, but can't seem to get the job done. Somehow also involved in the mix is a local socialite, a gentleman from an old planter family who is hiding a secret forbidden love with a black woman from long ago. If the affair comes to light, it will damage both persons, perhaps permanently. In typical Robicheaux style, Dave finds himself right in the middle of the conflicts, seeking truth where most would simply U-turn and live on in blissful ignorance. As Dave digs deeper and deeper, unpeeling the truth like layers on an onion, the story reeks more and more of secret government dealings, unauthorized killings, and rumors of a business deal that threatens to harm the fragile Louisiana wetland environment. In his incredible prosaic style, Burke pulls all the pieces together to weave a story as morbidly fascinating as it is documentary of the lifestyle of the Cajun bayou country that Burke knows so incredibly well. At times, you can smell the dirty rice sold on paper plates in Dave's favorite greasy spoon restaurants, hear the bass and goggle-eye perch splash in the bayou's predawn light, see the heat lightening over the marsh and smell the ozone in the air as a sudden storm blows in off of the Gulf of Mexico. I've never read an author that knows his subject in such intimate detail. Even Larry McMurtry must doff his hat to Burke in his kno! wledge of the people, culture, sights, sounds, and tastes of his subjects. This is one of Burke's very best.
Rating:
Summary: Angel Descending
Review: Set in the bayou country of Louisiana, 'Burning Angel' by James Lee Burke blends gritty crime fiction with an understated supernatural element that is both suspenseful and entertaining. Homicide detective Dave 'Streak' Robineaux investigates a double murder that involves Sonny Marsallus, a local gambler, money-launderer, and soldier of fortune. Robineaux isn't the only one interested in Marsallus; a shadowy cadre of assassins wants Sonny dead. During his investigation, Robineaux gets sidetracked into a land dispute between the poor, black Fontenots and an upper-class attorney, Molleen Bertrand. Burke displays a dazzling command of language and descriptive power, and his vision of the South is elegantly drawn, where ghosts of the past seem close at hand. The main characters, particularly Robineaux, Marsallus, and Bertrand are finely honed, as are the pimps, thugs, and crime lords of New Iberia. The book only falters in the depiction of the Fontenots. Burke is keenly sensitive to the plight of this family, cast as helpless victims to malevolent external forces (in this case an amoral white overclass). Although we empathize with the Fontenots, characters stripped of free will (and thus unable to influence events) are never interesting. Nevertheless, 'Burning Angel' is wonderfully paced and well written, and Burke's soaring prose elevates it to dizzying heights. Lost loves and family secrets haunt these characters, and as Robineaux visits the Bertrand plantation one last time, Burke closes with an epilogue that is a tour-de-force of sheer craft: "And like some pagan of old, weighing down spirits in the ground with tablets of stone, I cut a bucket full of chrysanthemums and drove out to the Bertrand plantation...all our stories begin here--mine, Molleen's, the Fontenot family's, even Sonny's." The story of the South begins and ends on the plantation. On this ground Burke seeks the interconnectedness of things; life begins in a lover's tryst, and ends in a graveyard, as Lee's phantom army marches through the trees. It is a remarkable gesture, a sweeping vision of life and death that lifts this book beyond its genre into something else, something that rings true in the human heart, something that we call art.
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