I read this book because my favorite writing instructor, Stacy Swann, wrote it; otherwise, I rarely choose literary fiction, yet this one is worth the effort and the literary tag.
The great takeaway from peeling the onion on these complicated characters through unexpected twists and turns is a call for maturity. To understand oneself grants human beings the clarity to see those we love with all their flaws and foibles.
A Good Morning America Book Club Pick! • A bighearted novel with technicolor characters, plenty of Texas swagger, and a powder keg of a plot in which marriages struggle, rivalries flare, and secrets explode, all with a clever wink toward classical mythology.
For fans of Madeline Miller's Circe: "The Iliad meets Friday Night Lights in this muscular, captivating debut" (Oprah Daily).
The Briscoe family is once again the talk of their small town when March returns to East Texas two years after he was caught having an affair with his brother's wife. His mother, June, hardly welcomes him back with…
An old timer told me Guthrie, not Kelton, was the greatest Western writer. In some ways, his era dates back to his style. However, the prose puts me there on horseback in a way no other author can do. This coming-of-age story recreated early ranching life.
The novel presents the rarest combination in historical fiction. Historical accuracy is matched with storytelling prose that lifts us off the page and onto the canvas of a great Western landscape.
When These Thousand Hills was published in 1956, The Saturday Review proclaimed it to be "so compelling that it is hard indeed to set aside until it has been devoured." Conjuring up the ephemeral world of cattle ranchers in the 1880s, this intimate saga delights in a Montana community's boisterous, wanderlusting eccentrics as they chase after love and their unbridled ambitions. At its center is Lat Evans, good-hearted and yet seduced by the possibilities for prosperity in his new life; gradually he discerns how the perils of the natural world, and most especially human nature, can conspire to frustrate a…
Great characters, storytelling, and the best prose in the genre drive a great read. The author pulled me into a story that I only later thought was implausible. The story thoroughly engrossed me.
Burke carries the reader into a mysterious world of noir at its finest. In every bayou, every parish, and every heart, there is some dark secret lurking, ever beckoning us to step a little further into his world. This is a brilliant example of hard-boiled mystery storytelling.
The 8th Dave Robicheaux novel from SUNDAY TIMES bestselling and award-winning author James Lee Burke.
Sonny Boy Marsallas, a New Orleans street hustler, entrusts Detective Dave Robicheaux with a mysterious notebook, kicking off a series of violent incidents and raising questions that need answers, and fast...
What did Sonny's girlfriend know that got her murdered? Why is Sonny known as Red Angel by Central American guerrillas? And what do the Mafia want with a desolate stretch of New Iberia? This time Sonny Boy may have pushed his luck with the Giacano family one deal too far.
A racist killer uses the resources of his Aryan gang to falsify an innocence claim, intending to use fraudulent evidence to gain his release from prison. Only the original trial team, cowboy detective E.J. Kane and his former prosecutor ex-wife Rebecca Johnson, refuse to surrender to injustice. An unrelated suicide holds the key to unraveling a massive conundrum of DNA evidence. Meanwhile, their daughter faces the stark consequences of drug addiction and continued victimization from sex trafficking. E.J. will have to battle a corrupt sheriff, an army of white supremacist, the legendary Big Thicket National Preserve, and a startling revelation about his past dishonor. The fast-paced modern world of changing social norms forces E.J. Kane to question the traditional codes of his heritage. He must embrace truth and reject false values to draw the hard lines necessary to forge the future.
