Rating: 
Summary: Great Read, Terrible Ending
Review: Having never read a James Lee Burke novel before, I gobbled up Cimarron Rose, enjoying meeting all the colorful characters, two of whom was Pete and his PI sidekick....couldn't wait to hear what happened to both of them and fully expected him to jump into the relationship he should have developed right from the gitco.I actually threw this book in the garbage (something I have very rarely ever done in my long reading life) after I read the last chapter. The recap of characters he gave us was [disappointing] and never once mentioned either of those two. It was a total let-down but obviously meant that I loved the book all the way to that point and was so emotionally involved with it that it hurt to close the book with so many questions still unanswered.
Rating: 
Summary: Burke at his best!!
Review: Burke introduces a new character and a new location. Billy Bob Holland is a ex-Houston cop, ex-Texas Ranger, ex-prosecutor and currently a trial lawyer. Holland is a complex character struggling with a violent past. Holland's illegitimate son has been charged with the murder of his girlfriend. The plot is complex with a multitude of characters. This novel is an excellent read, I didn't want to put it down. I think you will like this novel as much as I do.
Rating:
Summary: Baring the Soul
Review: Burke describes characters who are as incongruous as the landscape. The heat, the rain, and the desolation make the reader mighty glad not to live anywhere near Mr. Holland. The stated and understated violence is unsettling. One doesn't expect the protagonist, Billy Bob Holland, to die. He takes a lot of chances with some seriously sick people. I wondered why he could be so lucky. But then, I remembered it was only fiction. I dare you to put the book down once started. James Lee Burke has a way with prose that is metaphorical and lyrical. When he is describing ponds and bayoux, he is at his best.
Rating:
Summary: Biblical, dreamy,violent, Burke at his best
Review: James Lee Burke is a master at setting the scene and creating a feeling with his stories. His novels are so heartfelt and deep, that even if the story is a bit familar as the above reviewers have stated, for me at least it doesn't matter. Corruption and greed are at play in Deaf Smith, Texas. Billy Bob Holland, a one time Texas Ranger, is man with scars that he can't hide. He's a walking wound, attempting to understand why people act as they do, and if some of those people get into trouble, Billy Bob is there to defend them. He cant shake his violent past, a past that includes the death of his best friend, a man and event that he can't let go of. The story center's around a murder, the accused is someone that Billy Bob knows well, he knows the boy is innocent, but there are other's who seem bound and determined to nail the boy and Billy Bob. The pace is fast, the dialogue is short but real, you feel as if you went to Texas you might just run into Billy Bob. This is a book to enjoy, to sit back when the house is quiet and just read, letting yourself disappear into the world of James Lee Burke.
Rating:
Summary: Strong, deep writing. Ranks with other masterworks
Review: All right, for some reason I haven't been familiar with Burke's writing up to now. Nobody e-mailed me about him. I was surfing the Mystery Writers' Association website and I noticed that Burke has this habit of winning Edgar awards over and over, so I thought I'd check him out. This is one of the Edgar winners, and it supports my previously-expressed hypothesis that they don't give out the award by drawing names out of a hat. This is a very strong novel with a West Texas small-city/rural voice, with currents of Ross MacDonald and Dashiell Hammett, a touch of Larry McMurtry, and highlights of raspberry, chocolate, and tobacco. I'm sorry about the 'highlights', I realized I sounded as if I was describing wine and couldn't resist. I mean the other stuff, though, and it's all complimentary. By referring to MacDonald, I mean that Burke displays the same sense of complexity: of setting, of interaction. I mean, everyone has a history, everyone has secrets, and not just every major and minor character, but every place, every barn and lot and stream. And all of these secrets are liable to bubble up and confuse everyone at any moment and knock the plot into a new and surprising direction. Nobody is carrying out any one plan. Everyone has a lot of things on his/her mind. It's the exact opposite of the sense that you get with one of these serial-killer novels where the villain is omnipotent and single-minded and supremely organized and does nothing all day except perfect his serial killing plan. Here most of the people are at least somewhat friendly and at least somewhat dangerous, and the tensions seldom get resolved. However, Burke's style is not MacDonald's brooding tapestry of similes; it's much more like Hammett, spare, brisk, and violent; for example: "... [I] rode my Morgan up on the porch and through the doorway, ducking down on his withers to get under the jamb. .. "'I hope you brung your own dustpan and whisk broom,' the bartender said. "I rode the Morgan between a cluster of tables and chairs and across a small dance floor toward the pool table. The man eating from a paper plate looked at me, smiling, a spoonful of chili half-way to his mouth ... I whipped the loop three times over my head and flung it at the man with the blond beard ... He tried to rise from the chair and free himself, but I wound the rope tightly around the pommel, brought my left spur into the Morgan's side, and catapulted the blond man off his feet and dragged him caroming through tables and bar stools and splintering chairs, into an oak post and the legs of a pinball machine and the side of the jukebox, tearing a huge plastic divot out of the casing." Note how he uses the rhythm of the clauses to pace the action, short and simple as the action impends, then exploding along with the action into a sprawling run-on sentence. The action leaps along; the average 'scene' is a page or a page and a half long, and since something happens in every 'scene', by the time you are on page 10, things are moving fast and furious. This is also very much like Hammett: think about "Red Harvest", for example. Later, the county D.A. complains: "I work in a county that's so corrupt I have to confide in a defense lawyer who rides his horse into barrooms. I grant you, it's a pitiful situation." That last line is the sort of thing that makes me think of McMurtry - I mean the best McMurtry, "Lonesome Dove" in particular. Isn't that a gem? Can't you imagine Woodrow Call saying that? Or maybe it isn't McMurtry at all, maybe they just really talk like that all the time in West Texas, and Burke and McMurtry are just reporting it. Whichever, it's an attractive feature. The narrator, Billy Bob Holland, is a former Texas Ranger who has retreated into criminal defense work in self-imposed penance for accidentally shooting his partner and best friend, L. Q. Navarro, in a chaotic battle with drug smugglers down in Coahuila. He sees Navarro everywhere and talks with him, but these dialogues don't hurt the plot much. He is also re-reading his great-grandfather's journals, which are the stuff of a novel in themselves, in an attempt (I guess) to explore the question of whether and how you can get out of the rut of living in a violent and self-destructive culture. You can either treat this as an interesting interlude, or skip over it, or try to tie it in convincingly with the main action. I never really managed this last, but it doesn't bother me much. The plot starts off with Holland being summoned to defend a young man on charges of rape and murder, and the trial winds up near the end of the book, but to say that the book is 'about' the trial is to ignore the 15 other subplots that turn the narrative structure into a 'bush' rather than a 'ladder'. I guess the book is mainly about trying to do what's right even if you live in a really corrupt county and have a great burden of shame of your own. Unless you argue that the style itself is the content, as if it were a work of instrumental music. Whichever. Anyway, I recommend this book very highly.
Rating: 
Summary: Same story different setting
Review: If you have never read a Burke novel then you may like this. If you are familiar with the Robicheaux novels, then pass this one up. I like James Lee Burke's novels, but this book is just the same story and same characters with different names and in Texas instead of New Iberia, LA. Billy Bob is just Dave Robicheaux except as a small town lawyer rather than a small town cop. He has a woman partner, has semi-adopted a young ethnic child, talks to a ghost, defends the down-trodden and his father was killed in an oil company accident just like Robicheaux's father. He deals with sketchy characters from his past and has to deal with the "psychic scars" of his past as the NY Book Review put it. Sound familiar? If you have read the Robicheaux series then, of course it does. I found myself missing the antics of Clete Purcel. Same idea here: the rich and powerful screw with the down and out. Guess who wins in the end?
Rating:
Summary: Good read
Review: This was my first Burke novel and I thoroughly enjoyed it. The only thing bugging me was this Avalon business. Does Burke have some kind of deal with Toyota to keep plugging this car? It's just a little thing but it got distracting after awhile. Maybe not what I'd call the number one mystery of the year as the Edgar's gave it, but it was enjoyable.
Rating:
Summary: A well-done work by an excellent writer.
Review: Burke is a "reliable author". If you want to spend your time and money reasonably - "Cimarron Rose" is just what you need. Everything in the book is thought over thoroughly - characters, dialogues, places, actions. It is a well-balanced crime-story for leisurely reading.
Rating:
Summary: New characters and setting, but similar themes....
Review: Cimarron Rose carries the same style as James Lee Burke's other novels where the central focus is on the inner workings of the character's psyche and not some much on the plot, which takes a backseat. Once I got to know the new protagonist, Billy Bob Holland, I thoroughly enjoyed the novel.While the reading the book I had the opportunity to meet Mr. Burke and found that he really did have a great grandfather named Sam Holland who drove cattle on the Chisholm Trail, killed several men in gun fights and later became a preacher. As in the book, all this was recorded in a journal which Mr. Burke still has. While the novel is somewhat uneven and the plot muddled, even for a James Lee Burke story, I still can recommed it and look forward to reading "Heartwood" to see how this series progresses.
Rating: 
Summary: i read edgar books and i wonder is this the best that year?
Review: the story began well, the reviews it had seemed to make it appear like it really was a good work of fiction. well its good, i just wasnt convinced that it was the winner coz on the last part or past halfway of the book it seemed to have lost steam, the only saving grace was the courtroom drama of billy bob and his son which isnt that exciting really. anyway its good in its own right and i havent read his other book "black cherry blues" yet' so i guess the award giving body still have a chance to prove to me if the award was given out of favorit--- or theres no other better choice that year.
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