Rating: 
Summary: Small Town Defense Lawyer Plays Lone Ranger
Review: Cimarron Rose is a typically offbeat James Lee Burke tale, set in the small town of Deaf Smith, Texas. Defense attorney, Billy Bob Holland, is asked to take on the cases of two young men, and soon finds himself in the middle of a complex set of corrupt relationships that will not be sorted out unless he does it. The book has a fascinating story within a story delivered in the form of a journal inherited from his Great-grandpa Sam that Billy Bob reads almost daily while pursuing the case. The book has fascinating characters whose evil, blindness, and carelessness make the story develop in unexpected ways. Although the book has much violence in it, there is a genuine attempt to keep the violence within some sort of limits that makes the book more appealing.I like books that feature significant character development, and this one does an exemplary job with Billy Bob and Lucas Smothers, who is accused of a rape and murder. These two men are very complicated but in a way that will draw you in, and cause you to root for them to keep following their ideals and dreams. The backdrop is a crooked town, in a corrupt county, with lots of bent government types running around. Although probably no worse than a lot of other places, this book is about a sort of Texas Sodom and Gomorrah. There is a need for someone to do more than what is required, and Billy Bob takes on that role. You will find those who are satisfied with their wealthy lives just as culpable as those who are totally corrupt. Fans of the Dave Robicheaux novels will find this one follows the general approach of those rich, complex stories. Clearly, Billy Bob is a fellow who operates well outside the law, a sort of modern day Lone Ranger. At the same time, he can barely keep himself from going off the deep end mentally. As a result, he is sort of like a ticking time bomb, and you keep expecting him to go off. And he does. The plot culminates in a trial that presents the kind of unexpected developments that you will recognize from Perry Mason stories. After you finish reading this novel, you should think about when you should follow God's law, when men's laws, and when your own conscience. How would you have handled the dilemmas presented here for Billy Bob and Lucas? How could they have handled them better? Live in the present and make a pathway for good!
Rating: 
Summary: Not up to Author's Standards
Review: This is the eighth James Lee Burke book I have read. It may well be the last. Unhappily, Mr. Burke has adopted the "cookbook" approach to his novels, and I, for one, don't approve. As long as they sell, though, I suspect that he will continue to use that approach. However, one can always hope.
"Cimarron Rose" has the predictable human monster, hyper-introspective protagonist, stupid lawmen, and Burke's other standard characters. Unlike his earlier Dave Robichaux novels, though, characters in this book are cardboard-cutout in nature. I'm sorry I wasted my time on this one. Mr. Burke, do better; you are eminently capable of that!
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Summary: Distinctively Burke, for better or worse
Review: Having read several of James Lee Burke's novels now, I have come to see that his approach to weaving together a story is intriguingly unorthodox. His narrative is choppy and at times almost disjointed; short vignettes, encounters, and episodes are cobbled together, and change-of-voice digressions and flashbacks are not unusual. Readers accustomed to a smoother ride will find Burke's approach difficult in places. At the same time, Burke can positively hypnotize readers through the beauty of the language he employs and his ability to capture a thought, a moment, a mood, or a concept in a few well-chosen words or phrases. This combination of organizational looseness and powerful, evocative writing makes reading Burke a truly distinctive literary experience. In *Cimarron Rose*, Burke has taken a break from his Dave Robacheaux series and has introduced a new protagonist, Billy Bob Holland in a new setting, Deaf Smith County, Texas. Still, the overall tone and style of the story will be familiar to readers of previous Burke novels. Holland is another fallen lawman-type haunted by his past, and his similarity to Robacheaux in terms of his patterns of action and thinking are hardly surprising. The story itself is populated by desperate criminal types, fallen women, drunkards, corrupt "leading citizens," a demented maniac, and in fact, a entire cast of typical denizens of Burke's stories. With its loosely woven whodunit plot line and its accompanying quota of broken noses and gunshot wounds, the story is a kind of classic combination of police mystery and violent pulp fiction novella. Added to this are some interesting added elements, including recurring reference to Billy Bob's great-grandaddy's journal and the regular appearance of the ghost of Billy Bob's ex-best friend and partner. Combined with a rather weird ... ending, the whole mish-mash makes for interesting reading but doesn't constitute a satisfactorily well-woven novel overall. Despite its flaws, *Cimarron Rose* is worthwhile not only because of Burke's talents as a wordsmith, but also because of his astute eye for social and class interactions and conflict in his small-town southern setting. His descriptions of the myriad ways in which the affluent "East enders" dominate the small Texas community in which events unfold in this book shows Burke's keen understanding of the sociological and economic as well as psychological aspects of his human subject matter. Clearly, his own sympathies are with the lower classes, the downtrodden, the underprivileged, and the way he skewers the powerful and hypocritical in this book is impressive, indeed.
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