James Lee Burke | Swan Peak

Published: January 2, 2009

An almost radioactive violence – twined with lyrical descriptions of Montana’s landscape – pervades James Lee Burke’s latest Dave Robicheaux novel, Swan Peak. The result is both jarring and mesmerizing, making for yet another roller-coaster ride from the master of suspense novels.

But this ride travels through familiar terrain, at least for Montanans, as Detective Robicheaux, his wife Molly, and best friend, the unpredictable and trouble prone Clete Purcel, land on a ranch near Missoula for a reprieve from their beloved, hurricane-ravaged Louisiana.

As the duo gets drawn into an investigation of the grisly murder of a college coed and her boyfriend, their sleuthing takes them to the Swan Valley retreat of oil tycoon Ridley Wellstone and his deformed brother, Leslie, married to a gorgeous, hard-drinking country singer Jamie Sue Wellstone.

A slimy religious sycophant, a guitar-slinging prison escapee (with a voice like Jimmie Rodgers), a former guard at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq and his tattoo-covered girlfriend are among the cast of characters that keep the novel racing along in high gear – like Purcel’s maroon Cadillac on overdrive – for 400 pages. “Despite all the nastiness, love and redemption retain the power to heal some very wounded souls in a surprising denouement,” writes Publishers Weekly.

Burke, a recipient of the Governor’s Arts Award, resides in Missoula and New Iberia, LA. This is his 27th novel; he’s also written two collections of short stories.

– Kristi Niemeyer