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Dave Robicheaux #24
Clete: A Dave Robicheaux Novel
In the latest installment in his famous Detective Dave Robicheaux series, New York Times bestselling author James Lee Burke brings Dave’s partner and friend Clete Purcel to the forefront for the first time as Clete and Dave attempt to stop ruthless smugglers of a dangerous new drug
Clete Purcel – private investigator, ex-member of the New Orleans Police Department, and war veteran with a hard shell and just a few soft spots – is Dave Robicheaux’s longtime friend and partner in detective work. But he has a troubled past. When Clete leaves his car at the local car wash, only to return to find it ransacked by a group of thugs tied to the drug trade from Mexican cartels to Louisiana, it feels personal – his grandniece died of a fentanyl overdose, and his fists curl when he thinks of the dealers who sold it.
Just as Clete starts to trail the culprits, Clara Bow, a woman with a dark past hires Clete as a detective to investigate her scheming, slippery ex-husband, and a string of brutal deaths all link back to a heavily tattooed man who seems to lurk around every corner. Clete is experiencing shockingly lifelike hallucinations and questioning Clara’s ulterior motives when he and Dave start to hear rumors of a dangerous substance with potentially catastrophic effects. The thugs who destroyed his car might have been pawns in a scheme far darker than they could’ve imagined.
Gripping, violent, yet interlaced with Clete’s humor and consistent drive to protect those he loves, Clete brings a fresh perspective to a truly iconic series. James Lee Burke proves yet again that he is the “heavyweight champ” and “great American novelist whose work, taken individually or as a whole, is unsurpassed” (Michael Connelly).
Clete Purcel – private investigator, ex-member of the New Orleans Police Department, and war veteran with a hard shell and just a few soft spots – is Dave Robicheaux’s longtime friend and partner in detective work. But he has a troubled past. When Clete leaves his car at the local car wash, only to return to find it ransacked by a group of thugs tied to the drug trade from Mexican cartels to Louisiana, it feels personal – his grandniece died of a fentanyl overdose, and his fists curl when he thinks of the dealers who sold it.
Just as Clete starts to trail the culprits, Clara Bow, a woman with a dark past hires Clete as a detective to investigate her scheming, slippery ex-husband, and a string of brutal deaths all link back to a heavily tattooed man who seems to lurk around every corner. Clete is experiencing shockingly lifelike hallucinations and questioning Clara’s ulterior motives when he and Dave start to hear rumors of a dangerous substance with potentially catastrophic effects. The thugs who destroyed his car might have been pawns in a scheme far darker than they could’ve imagined.
Gripping, violent, yet interlaced with Clete’s humor and consistent drive to protect those he loves, Clete brings a fresh perspective to a truly iconic series. James Lee Burke proves yet again that he is the “heavyweight champ” and “great American novelist whose work, taken individually or as a whole, is unsurpassed” (Michael Connelly).
312 pages, Kindle Edition
First published June 11, 2024
About the author
James Lee Burke
164 books3,902 followersJames Lee Burke is an American author best known for his mysteries, particularly the Dave Robicheaux series. He has twice received the Edgar Award for Best Novel, for
Black Cherry Blues
in 1990 and
Cimarron Rose
in 1998.
Burke was born in Houston, Texas, but grew up on the Texas-Louisiana Gulf Coast. He attended the University of Louisiana at Lafayette and the University of Missouri, receiving a BA and MA from the latter. He has worked at a wide variety of jobs over the years, including working in the oil industry, as a reporter, and as a social worker. He was Writer in Residence at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette, succeeding his good friend and posthumous Pulitzer Prize winner John Kennedy Toole, and preceding Ernest Gaines in the position. Shortly before his move to Montana, he taught for several years in the Creative Writing program at Wichita State University in the 1980s.
Burke and his wife, Pearl, split their time between Lolo, Montana, and New Iberia, Louisiana. Their daughter, Alafair Burke, is also a mystery novelist.
The book that has influenced his life the most is the 1929 family tragedy "The Sound and the Fury" by William Faulkner.
Burke was born in Houston, Texas, but grew up on the Texas-Louisiana Gulf Coast. He attended the University of Louisiana at Lafayette and the University of Missouri, receiving a BA and MA from the latter. He has worked at a wide variety of jobs over the years, including working in the oil industry, as a reporter, and as a social worker. He was Writer in Residence at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette, succeeding his good friend and posthumous Pulitzer Prize winner John Kennedy Toole, and preceding Ernest Gaines in the position. Shortly before his move to Montana, he taught for several years in the Creative Writing program at Wichita State University in the 1980s.
Burke and his wife, Pearl, split their time between Lolo, Montana, and New Iberia, Louisiana. Their daughter, Alafair Burke, is also a mystery novelist.
The book that has influenced his life the most is the 1929 family tragedy "The Sound and the Fury" by William Faulkner.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 348 reviews
June 11, 2024
I finished reading this book some days ago, and ever since I’ve been ruminating on what I think of it. To start with, it’s fair to say that JLB has long been the writer who excites me and drags me into a story to a greater extent than any other. His descriptions of place and people are, I believe, peerless. His tales are about good versus evil, though even the good people in his books have significant flaws. The bad are as grim and malevolently violent as any I’ve come across in literature or film. It’s this clash, this sublime contest, that I’ve found totally compelling for thirty years or more. But in recent years, Burke has started to introduce paranormal elements increasingly, his characters having visions of events and of people that make no sense in everyday life. It’s this trend in his writing that gives me pause.
The author’s Dave Robicheaux novels are probably my favourites, set mainly in Southern Louisiana settings that Burke describes so brilliantly and with such personal loving. Robicheaux, a sometimes lawman, is usually accompanied by his best friend and ex-partner in the NOPD, Clete Purcell. Dave can sometimes lose it and snap into acts of extreme violence, but Clete takes this to another level: one minute, creating mayhem and the next cracking wise with a comment that has me laughing out loud. To date, these books have focused on events as seen through the eyes of Robicheaux, but this time it’s through Clete that we watch events unfold. To me, this was like looking at the world through tinted lenses: things look as they always did, but at the same time, they seem different. It was intriguing to see the world through the eyes of Purcell for the first time and to obtain insight into his inner thoughts on life and also on Dave.
The story itself takes us back quite a few years. At this point, Clete was a private investigator based in New Orleans, and Dave was a police officer working out of New Iberia. Clete has a bad experience shortly after having his car returned from a car wash owned by an old friend. He wakes in the night to find a bunch of men stripping down his lovingly restored Cadillac. A violent exchange ensues, with Clete winding up on the wrong end of a beating. It seems that the men were looking for a stash of super-charged Fentanyl that had been planted in Clete’s car by mistake. Dave is soon on the scene, and the pair attempt to track down those responsible with a view to dispensing their own form of justice.
So far, so good. But then Clete begins to receive visits from a historical figure from 15th century France, who seems intent on passing him messages. The meanings are often obscure, and it’s at this point that I started to struggle with a meandering narrative, which sometimes bordered on incomprehensible. Are these visions a result of the beating Clete took? It’s not clear. But as the story plays out it’s fair to say that the plotline doesn’t really function without these interventions. Such elements have occasionally surfaced in even Burke's early books, but they’re much more prevalent of late. I’m not sure why this is. It’s been suggested to me that it’s a result of Burke’s age (he’s 87 years old) and therefore facing what are most likely the last years of his life. This might be so, and perhaps I’ll understand this more as I steadily make my way to the same place.
As a piece of writing it’s first class, and the book is well worth reading to experience the superb way JLB is able to put sentences together in a way I think no other writer can. But as a story it’s flawed, difficult to follow, and fairly predictable in how it’s going to end. However, it’s Dave and Clete, and I’d happily open a new book every day to read another adventure featuring this pair.
My thanks to Grove Atlantic for supplying a copy of this book via NetGalley in return for an honest review.
The author’s Dave Robicheaux novels are probably my favourites, set mainly in Southern Louisiana settings that Burke describes so brilliantly and with such personal loving. Robicheaux, a sometimes lawman, is usually accompanied by his best friend and ex-partner in the NOPD, Clete Purcell. Dave can sometimes lose it and snap into acts of extreme violence, but Clete takes this to another level: one minute, creating mayhem and the next cracking wise with a comment that has me laughing out loud. To date, these books have focused on events as seen through the eyes of Robicheaux, but this time it’s through Clete that we watch events unfold. To me, this was like looking at the world through tinted lenses: things look as they always did, but at the same time, they seem different. It was intriguing to see the world through the eyes of Purcell for the first time and to obtain insight into his inner thoughts on life and also on Dave.
The story itself takes us back quite a few years. At this point, Clete was a private investigator based in New Orleans, and Dave was a police officer working out of New Iberia. Clete has a bad experience shortly after having his car returned from a car wash owned by an old friend. He wakes in the night to find a bunch of men stripping down his lovingly restored Cadillac. A violent exchange ensues, with Clete winding up on the wrong end of a beating. It seems that the men were looking for a stash of super-charged Fentanyl that had been planted in Clete’s car by mistake. Dave is soon on the scene, and the pair attempt to track down those responsible with a view to dispensing their own form of justice.
So far, so good. But then Clete begins to receive visits from a historical figure from 15th century France, who seems intent on passing him messages. The meanings are often obscure, and it’s at this point that I started to struggle with a meandering narrative, which sometimes bordered on incomprehensible. Are these visions a result of the beating Clete took? It’s not clear. But as the story plays out it’s fair to say that the plotline doesn’t really function without these interventions. Such elements have occasionally surfaced in even Burke's early books, but they’re much more prevalent of late. I’m not sure why this is. It’s been suggested to me that it’s a result of Burke’s age (he’s 87 years old) and therefore facing what are most likely the last years of his life. This might be so, and perhaps I’ll understand this more as I steadily make my way to the same place.
As a piece of writing it’s first class, and the book is well worth reading to experience the superb way JLB is able to put sentences together in a way I think no other writer can. But as a story it’s flawed, difficult to follow, and fairly predictable in how it’s going to end. However, it’s Dave and Clete, and I’d happily open a new book every day to read another adventure featuring this pair.
My thanks to Grove Atlantic for supplying a copy of this book via NetGalley in return for an honest review.
June 10, 2024
From the Podna
James Lee Burke’s Robicheaux stories have everything– drama, action, humor, violence, evil, justice, the beauty of Louisiana painted with such eloquence– but the most potent treasures they possess are the characters of Dave Robicheaux and his “podna” Clete Purcel. Clete is now a private investigator, having previously been run off the New Orleans PD. Dave had served with him and is currently a sheriff’s detective in New Iberia. Through two dozen books we see these two face down the worst in humanity without compromise, all the time struggling with their own personal demons.
This is the first in the series told in Clete’s words. Although Dave has had his episodes of explosive violence (often during blackouts he does not fully remember), Clete has always been portrayed as the enforcer, much quicker to get physical no matter what the consequences.
As the story opens, Clete discovers three thugs tearing his Cadillac Eldorado apart. The car had just spent a few days at a friend's car wash and the suspicion is something, maybe fentanyl, had been stashed. Clete confronts these guys, takes a beating, and launches his own investigation into why he is being targeted. Whatever was hidden away has not been found and people around Clete are suffering the consequences. One recurring trait of his is the tendency to dive blindly into saving the damsel in distress… and it is a big part of what happens here.
Both Dave and Clete live with PTSD from their time in the Vietnam War. In addition to flashbacks, Dave has seen and heard manifestations of the ghosts of the Civil War action in the area. Now Clete is visited by an apparition, a historical figure now here to guide him. Is she a figment of his imagination? Is she a result of blunt force trauma? And if she is not real, how did she appear to shoot his attacker with a sniper rifle?
As the plot revs up to include more at stake than just a failed drug transaction, we are treated to the brilliance of James Lee Burke’s prose. Louisiana becomes a very real character in all this series, and we dissolve into its landscape.
“The rumbling in the clouds and the waterspouts on the horizon make you tremble. The sun does not go down; it dies, and its fire takes its red smoke with it.”
The plot is always a judgment of good versus evil, seeing how it plays out in society. Clete is called a protector, “like (an) angel with big wings.” He carries around an old photo of a mother walking her children at a concentration camp, a reminder of an unavenged atrocity. These guys cannot stand by and let the powerful prey on the weak, to let hate groups go unchecked.
“In my lifetime I had seen numerous groups come and go. Their names change, but their membership remains the same— people who feel they have been left out. They blame immigrants and women and gay people and Jews and Blacks and anyone else they can pick on. Needless to say, most of them are not bright and get chewed up and spat out by the rich people who exploit them.”
The novels of James Lee Burke have been cherished gifts for me, and this is no exception.
Thank you to Grove Atlantic, NetGalley, and Edelweiss for providing an advance reader copy in exchange for an honest review. #Clete #NetGalley
James Lee Burke’s Robicheaux stories have everything– drama, action, humor, violence, evil, justice, the beauty of Louisiana painted with such eloquence– but the most potent treasures they possess are the characters of Dave Robicheaux and his “podna” Clete Purcel. Clete is now a private investigator, having previously been run off the New Orleans PD. Dave had served with him and is currently a sheriff’s detective in New Iberia. Through two dozen books we see these two face down the worst in humanity without compromise, all the time struggling with their own personal demons.
This is the first in the series told in Clete’s words. Although Dave has had his episodes of explosive violence (often during blackouts he does not fully remember), Clete has always been portrayed as the enforcer, much quicker to get physical no matter what the consequences.
As the story opens, Clete discovers three thugs tearing his Cadillac Eldorado apart. The car had just spent a few days at a friend's car wash and the suspicion is something, maybe fentanyl, had been stashed. Clete confronts these guys, takes a beating, and launches his own investigation into why he is being targeted. Whatever was hidden away has not been found and people around Clete are suffering the consequences. One recurring trait of his is the tendency to dive blindly into saving the damsel in distress… and it is a big part of what happens here.
Both Dave and Clete live with PTSD from their time in the Vietnam War. In addition to flashbacks, Dave has seen and heard manifestations of the ghosts of the Civil War action in the area. Now Clete is visited by an apparition, a historical figure now here to guide him. Is she a figment of his imagination? Is she a result of blunt force trauma? And if she is not real, how did she appear to shoot his attacker with a sniper rifle?
As the plot revs up to include more at stake than just a failed drug transaction, we are treated to the brilliance of James Lee Burke’s prose. Louisiana becomes a very real character in all this series, and we dissolve into its landscape.
“The rumbling in the clouds and the waterspouts on the horizon make you tremble. The sun does not go down; it dies, and its fire takes its red smoke with it.”
The plot is always a judgment of good versus evil, seeing how it plays out in society. Clete is called a protector, “like (an) angel with big wings.” He carries around an old photo of a mother walking her children at a concentration camp, a reminder of an unavenged atrocity. These guys cannot stand by and let the powerful prey on the weak, to let hate groups go unchecked.
“In my lifetime I had seen numerous groups come and go. Their names change, but their membership remains the same— people who feel they have been left out. They blame immigrants and women and gay people and Jews and Blacks and anyone else they can pick on. Needless to say, most of them are not bright and get chewed up and spat out by the rich people who exploit them.”
The novels of James Lee Burke have been cherished gifts for me, and this is no exception.
Thank you to Grove Atlantic, NetGalley, and Edelweiss for providing an advance reader copy in exchange for an honest review. #Clete #NetGalley
March 8, 2024
Clete (available June 2024) is the latest in a long string of Dave Robicheaux novels by Burke. Told in Clete Purcell's narrative voice, it is a dark tale. Indeed, as it begins, Clete tells us that "Southern Louisiana is heaven, as long as you keep one eye closed and don't dwell on the corruption that's a way of life here." Clete is a former Vietnam Vet, suffering from PTSD, which now seems to manifest itself in a real-life Joan of Arc sitting there with him in her armor and medieval world. Purcell is a private eye since being forced out of the New Orleans Police Department. He has few allies, but Dave is his best friend.
The story starts small with Purcell waking up to find three low lifes tearing apart his 1959 lavender-pink Eldorado, looking for something, which turns out to be a new drug that will destroy the world. As if we needed more of those. He spends his time thereafter trying to figure out what the lowlifes wanted and pursuing them across the bayou. He rescues Chen from another lowlife and tries to wean her off heroin with the help of a stripper friend. He agrees to take on a case from a neighbor with an abusive husband, one who seems to be the front money behind a new hate movement in the area.
What makes this novel sing out loud is the depth of emotional turmoil Clete is put through. Wondering throughout if he is losing his mind or someone has drugged him, he is often barely in touch with reality, but still stands up against the evil that is lurking in the bayou.
The story starts small with Purcell waking up to find three low lifes tearing apart his 1959 lavender-pink Eldorado, looking for something, which turns out to be a new drug that will destroy the world. As if we needed more of those. He spends his time thereafter trying to figure out what the lowlifes wanted and pursuing them across the bayou. He rescues Chen from another lowlife and tries to wean her off heroin with the help of a stripper friend. He agrees to take on a case from a neighbor with an abusive husband, one who seems to be the front money behind a new hate movement in the area.
What makes this novel sing out loud is the depth of emotional turmoil Clete is put through. Wondering throughout if he is losing his mind or someone has drugged him, he is often barely in touch with reality, but still stands up against the evil that is lurking in the bayou.
June 12, 2024
The 24th book in the Dave Robicheaux series is once again filled with the atmospheric beauty of Southern Louisiana that, in turn, is filled with brutal low-lifes and fed with great food. But this one is told from the perspective of Dave’s best friend and erstwhile sidekick Cletus Purcel.
From the low-key start of Clete walking out one day to find his Eldorado being torn apart by three local hoods. It had just come back from a local car wash and they were supposedly looking for drugs that had been stashed somewhere in the car. He embarks on a personal odyssey to clean up his part of Louisiana.
The idea of a new lethal drug being introduced into his neck of the woods doesn’t sit well with Clete, so stopping the three would-be drug runners becomes front of mind for the Vietnam veteran turned private investigator.
Along the way he rescues Chen, a heroin addict who has fallen under the control of another evil so-and-so. And then a woman named Clara Bow drops in wanting to hire him to help her escape from her abusive husband.
It’s a full plate for Clete who routinely suffers little setbacks from the PTSD carried over from his days in Vietnam. The most notable of these are the visits he gets from Joan of Arc, who seems to materialize at the direst of moments to take a hand in saving his life. Dave helps, by the way.
The high points stem from the easygoing friendship between Clete and Dave as they stoically take every adversary head on and with full force. These moments of repartee are usually accompanied by some classic Cajun or Creole dishes and are set in the most vividly described locations that essentially plonks you down in the middle with them. Great action and (usually) violence ensues.
Where it gets a bit difficult is the inner turmoil that Clete battles with inside his own mind. He’s constantly trying to work out what’s real and what’s drug, alcohol or imagination fueled. Sometimes there’s no explanation about real and imaginary with many long rambling accounts that lead nowhere and are related apropos of nothing relevant. I found these pieces difficult to follow and tended to start skimming my way over them for fear of getting interminably bogged down.
But the moments of deep thinking, drug-infused rambling nonsense aside, time spent with Dave and Clete in Southern Louisiana is good time as far as I’m concerned. With Dave and Clete around to greet people with “What’s the haps” there will always be knights errant around to stick up for the weak and vulnerable and they do it with a certain style.
My thanks to Grove Atlantic and NetGalley for supplying a copy of this digital ARC to allow me to read, enjoy and write this review.
From the low-key start of Clete walking out one day to find his Eldorado being torn apart by three local hoods. It had just come back from a local car wash and they were supposedly looking for drugs that had been stashed somewhere in the car. He embarks on a personal odyssey to clean up his part of Louisiana.
The idea of a new lethal drug being introduced into his neck of the woods doesn’t sit well with Clete, so stopping the three would-be drug runners becomes front of mind for the Vietnam veteran turned private investigator.
Along the way he rescues Chen, a heroin addict who has fallen under the control of another evil so-and-so. And then a woman named Clara Bow drops in wanting to hire him to help her escape from her abusive husband.
It’s a full plate for Clete who routinely suffers little setbacks from the PTSD carried over from his days in Vietnam. The most notable of these are the visits he gets from Joan of Arc, who seems to materialize at the direst of moments to take a hand in saving his life. Dave helps, by the way.
The high points stem from the easygoing friendship between Clete and Dave as they stoically take every adversary head on and with full force. These moments of repartee are usually accompanied by some classic Cajun or Creole dishes and are set in the most vividly described locations that essentially plonks you down in the middle with them. Great action and (usually) violence ensues.
Where it gets a bit difficult is the inner turmoil that Clete battles with inside his own mind. He’s constantly trying to work out what’s real and what’s drug, alcohol or imagination fueled. Sometimes there’s no explanation about real and imaginary with many long rambling accounts that lead nowhere and are related apropos of nothing relevant. I found these pieces difficult to follow and tended to start skimming my way over them for fear of getting interminably bogged down.
But the moments of deep thinking, drug-infused rambling nonsense aside, time spent with Dave and Clete in Southern Louisiana is good time as far as I’m concerned. With Dave and Clete around to greet people with “What’s the haps” there will always be knights errant around to stick up for the weak and vulnerable and they do it with a certain style.
My thanks to Grove Atlantic and NetGalley for supplying a copy of this digital ARC to allow me to read, enjoy and write this review.
June 18, 2024
Set in the lates ‘90s in southern Louisiana, Clete is the 24th book in the Dave Robicheaux series by James Lee Burke only, in this novel, Cletus Purcell, Dave’s long-time friend, one-time partner in the police, and now private investigator, is narrator and main protagonist. He had left his prized cadillac at a friend’s car wash for detailing but, when he returns several days later, he finds it being torn apart by three goons linked to the cartels. This will lead him and Dave on a chase to prevent the unleashing of a new and extremely toxic substance on the world.
James Lee Burke is one of America’s greatest writers whose books never disappoint and Clete is a good example of why. At heart, Burke’s tales are about the battle between good and evil but that doesn’t make them simple. Clete, once sidekick, now main protagonist, has a very distinct voice that adds layers to his character and neither he nor the story let up from first page to last. Combining elements of noir, southern Gothic, spirituality and a touch of the supernatural with beautiful, descriptive prose, and complex characters, this is one atmospheric, gritty, often violent, and always compelling read that examines many of the tough issues of the time but that are still as important, if not more so today, and I loved every nail-biting twist and turn of it.
Thanks to Netgalley and the publishers for the opportunity to read this book in exchange for an honest review
James Lee Burke is one of America’s greatest writers whose books never disappoint and Clete is a good example of why. At heart, Burke’s tales are about the battle between good and evil but that doesn’t make them simple. Clete, once sidekick, now main protagonist, has a very distinct voice that adds layers to his character and neither he nor the story let up from first page to last. Combining elements of noir, southern Gothic, spirituality and a touch of the supernatural with beautiful, descriptive prose, and complex characters, this is one atmospheric, gritty, often violent, and always compelling read that examines many of the tough issues of the time but that are still as important, if not more so today, and I loved every nail-biting twist and turn of it.
Thanks to Netgalley and the publishers for the opportunity to read this book in exchange for an honest review
June 8, 2024
This is the 24th book in the Dave Robicheaux series, but i tis the first one I've read. I think I would have benefited from reading some of the prior books to have a better understanding of Dave Robicheaux, but this book seems to be told completely from Clete Purcel's point of view.
Description:
Clete Purcel—private investigator, former New Orleans cop, and war veteran with a hard shell covering a few soft spots—is Dave Robicheaux’s longtime friend and detective partner. But he has a troubled past. When Clete picks up his Caddy from a local car wash, only to find it ransacked by a group of thugs tied to the drug trade, it feels personal—his grandniece died of a fentanyl overdose—and his fists curl when he thinks of the dealers who sold it.
As Clete traces the connections in this far-reaching criminal enterprise, Clara Bow, a woman with a dark past, hires Clete to investigate her scheming, slippery ex-husband, and a string of brutal deaths link back to a heavily tattooed man who lurks around every corner. Clete experiences shockingly lifelike hallucinations and questions Clara’s ulterior motives when he and Dave hear rumors of a dangerous substance with potentially catastrophic effects. The thugs who destroyed his car might have been pawns in a scheme far darker than they could’ve imagined.
My Thoughts:
It took me some time to get used to the writing style. The story is told from Clete's point of view and is filled with what I call "tough guy" language. There were times I had to stop and look up some terms because I didn't know what the book was talking about - terms like "Mick" and "F.T.S' and 'slack time' and 'got naped'- I had no clue. The book had a claustrophobic, criminal atmosphere throughout. Then there were the visions that both Clete and Dave seemed haunted by, a product of their time spent serving our country during war time. The ghost of Joan of Arc kept appearing to Clete and I didn't get that either. I never felt close to any of the characters. I did feel sorry for Chen though. There's a good story here, but it's not my type of book. I think those who really like mob stories would probably enjoy it.
Thanks to Grove Atlantic through Netgalley for an advance copy.
Description:
Clete Purcel—private investigator, former New Orleans cop, and war veteran with a hard shell covering a few soft spots—is Dave Robicheaux’s longtime friend and detective partner. But he has a troubled past. When Clete picks up his Caddy from a local car wash, only to find it ransacked by a group of thugs tied to the drug trade, it feels personal—his grandniece died of a fentanyl overdose—and his fists curl when he thinks of the dealers who sold it.
As Clete traces the connections in this far-reaching criminal enterprise, Clara Bow, a woman with a dark past, hires Clete to investigate her scheming, slippery ex-husband, and a string of brutal deaths link back to a heavily tattooed man who lurks around every corner. Clete experiences shockingly lifelike hallucinations and questions Clara’s ulterior motives when he and Dave hear rumors of a dangerous substance with potentially catastrophic effects. The thugs who destroyed his car might have been pawns in a scheme far darker than they could’ve imagined.
My Thoughts:
It took me some time to get used to the writing style. The story is told from Clete's point of view and is filled with what I call "tough guy" language. There were times I had to stop and look up some terms because I didn't know what the book was talking about - terms like "Mick" and "F.T.S' and 'slack time' and 'got naped'- I had no clue. The book had a claustrophobic, criminal atmosphere throughout. Then there were the visions that both Clete and Dave seemed haunted by, a product of their time spent serving our country during war time. The ghost of Joan of Arc kept appearing to Clete and I didn't get that either. I never felt close to any of the characters. I did feel sorry for Chen though. There's a good story here, but it's not my type of book. I think those who really like mob stories would probably enjoy it.
Thanks to Grove Atlantic through Netgalley for an advance copy.
June 24, 2024
It's been a month since I read Clete, and I still don't know how I feel about it. I've recently begun reading James Lee Burke, and this was my first time reading the Dave Robicheaux series; I didn't know what to expect. The few books I've read of Burke's are visceral, atmospheric, and beautifully written. And that is the problem with Clete.
Clete is not an easy read by any means. It is dark, violent, and honestly depressing as hell. Burke can pull the reader into his stories; you feel like you're next to Robicheaux and Clete. The flashbacks are heartbreaking and ethereal.
Clete took me places I didn't want to go. I don't think I've been as depressed when I finished a book as I've been after Clete. And that is the crux of the problem. The writing is breathtaking, and poignant, and forces the reader to face some uncomfortable truths. No matter how uncomfortable Clete made me, I couldn't put it down. That, to me, is the hallmark of a standout author.
Thank you to Atlantic Monthly Press and NetGalley for the opportunity to read an advanced copy of Clete.
Clete is not an easy read by any means. It is dark, violent, and honestly depressing as hell. Burke can pull the reader into his stories; you feel like you're next to Robicheaux and Clete. The flashbacks are heartbreaking and ethereal.
Clete took me places I didn't want to go. I don't think I've been as depressed when I finished a book as I've been after Clete. And that is the crux of the problem. The writing is breathtaking, and poignant, and forces the reader to face some uncomfortable truths. No matter how uncomfortable Clete made me, I couldn't put it down. That, to me, is the hallmark of a standout author.
Thank you to Atlantic Monthly Press and NetGalley for the opportunity to read an advanced copy of Clete.
March 14, 2024
I’m a big James Lee Burke fan and have thoroughly enjoyed his novels, especially those starring police detective Dave Robicheaux. They’re beautifully written, feature compelling characters, and excel at imparting to readers the sights, sounds, aromas, and auras of New Orleans and Louisiana’s bayou country.
His latest offering, “Clete,” is probably my least favorite of the “Robicheaux” series. While it has many of the strengths of its preceding volumes, the actual story seemed rushed, disjointed, and altogether confusing. Additionally, it has a speculative element to it that left me wondering what was real, what was not, and what actually happened.
The story is told by Robicheaux’s best friend and former NOPD partner, Clete, a troubled soul who has always wanted to do good but has often been compelled to commit bad, even heinous acts. Indeed, he’s so distressed that he believes that he’s in communion with 15th-century heroine and patron saint of France, Joan of Arc, who has a part in the novel and guides some of Clete’s decisions.
Clete and Dave find themselves pitted against a variety of villains: a Ponzi scheme runner and the filmmaking wife he’s tortured, drug traffickers, antisemitic white supremacists, and purveyors of a substance so dangerous it threatens to cause a worldwide disaster. All these characters and plot lines make for a mystery, or mysteries, I found very confusing; and none of which struck me as ever being truly solved. I also thought some of the characters, especially the people Clete and Dave seek to protect were not as fully or deeply drawn as they could have been.
Nevertheless, Mr. Burke’s prose and his depictions of Louisiana life remain stellar.
My thanks to NetGalley, author James Lee Burke, and publisher Grove Atlantic, Atlantic Monthly Press for providing me with a complimentary ARC. The foregoing is my independent opinion.
His latest offering, “Clete,” is probably my least favorite of the “Robicheaux” series. While it has many of the strengths of its preceding volumes, the actual story seemed rushed, disjointed, and altogether confusing. Additionally, it has a speculative element to it that left me wondering what was real, what was not, and what actually happened.
The story is told by Robicheaux’s best friend and former NOPD partner, Clete, a troubled soul who has always wanted to do good but has often been compelled to commit bad, even heinous acts. Indeed, he’s so distressed that he believes that he’s in communion with 15th-century heroine and patron saint of France, Joan of Arc, who has a part in the novel and guides some of Clete’s decisions.
Clete and Dave find themselves pitted against a variety of villains: a Ponzi scheme runner and the filmmaking wife he’s tortured, drug traffickers, antisemitic white supremacists, and purveyors of a substance so dangerous it threatens to cause a worldwide disaster. All these characters and plot lines make for a mystery, or mysteries, I found very confusing; and none of which struck me as ever being truly solved. I also thought some of the characters, especially the people Clete and Dave seek to protect were not as fully or deeply drawn as they could have been.
Nevertheless, Mr. Burke’s prose and his depictions of Louisiana life remain stellar.
My thanks to NetGalley, author James Lee Burke, and publisher Grove Atlantic, Atlantic Monthly Press for providing me with a complimentary ARC. The foregoing is my independent opinion.
August 7, 2024
I like this author a lot,but I really prefer the books that are not part of this series. The plot of this book was too convoluted and preposterous for me, and when Clete started conversing with Joan of Arc the book lost me. This was not one of my favorites.
I received a free copy of this book from the publisher.
I received a free copy of this book from the publisher.
June 16, 2024
I liked this more than that rating implies. Let me explain.
Our MC wakes up one morning to find three thugs tearing apart his classic Cadi. Fisticuffs ensue because Clete, and off we go as he tries to figure out what they wanted. Along the way a beautiful married woman hires him to convince her abusive husband to stay away from her (how does Clete keep attracting these types of women, looking for this kind of help?), and lowlife scum get a trafficked woman named Chen hooked on smack. The impetus of the overall plot is the drug trade and the poisons being pumped into the most vulnerable among us. Speaking of drugs, Clete spends a good portion of the book pondering his visions of Joan of Arc, who miraculously appears to him during moments of great crisis or mortal injury...
Clete's train of thought, to which we are constantly exposed, is just that: a runaway locomotive composed of black chaos, spewing nearly incomprehensible slang and Vietnam War references. It frequently makes laugh. The plot moves so fast that you're forced to get the gist and stay moving - which is fine, because the gist is always Clete's mad as hell, and he's not going to take this anymore! Dave is riding on the crazy train, too. Originally divorced but now a three-time widower, he lives alone while daughter Alafair is off living her best young adult life.
So here we are again with a fantastic, fast-paced, super fun novel led by two of the toughest hombres ever to formerly wear the badge (Clete is persona non grata at the LEO certification agency, and Dave is... on extended sabbatical, as encouraged by Sheriff Helen Soileau). I expected something different, something more, when I learned JLB was writing Clete's book. Now that I've finished it, I wonder what the point was. This could've just been another Dave book, except now we know that Clete hallucinates just as much as Robicheaux.
Does my favorite living author, James Lee Burke, have another Robicheaux novel in him? I certainly hope so, but at 87 years young, who knows. All my fingers and toes are crossed. *FUN FACT: JLB and I share the same birthday.
Our MC wakes up one morning to find three thugs tearing apart his classic Cadi. Fisticuffs ensue because Clete, and off we go as he tries to figure out what they wanted. Along the way a beautiful married woman hires him to convince her abusive husband to stay away from her (how does Clete keep attracting these types of women, looking for this kind of help?), and lowlife scum get a trafficked woman named Chen hooked on smack. The impetus of the overall plot is the drug trade and the poisons being pumped into the most vulnerable among us. Speaking of drugs, Clete spends a good portion of the book pondering his visions of Joan of Arc, who miraculously appears to him during moments of great crisis or mortal injury...
Clete's train of thought, to which we are constantly exposed, is just that: a runaway locomotive composed of black chaos, spewing nearly incomprehensible slang and Vietnam War references. It frequently makes laugh. The plot moves so fast that you're forced to get the gist and stay moving - which is fine, because the gist is always Clete's mad as hell, and he's not going to take this anymore! Dave is riding on the crazy train, too. Originally divorced but now a three-time widower, he lives alone while daughter Alafair is off living her best young adult life.
So here we are again with a fantastic, fast-paced, super fun novel led by two of the toughest hombres ever to formerly wear the badge (Clete is persona non grata at the LEO certification agency, and Dave is... on extended sabbatical, as encouraged by Sheriff Helen Soileau). I expected something different, something more, when I learned JLB was writing Clete's book. Now that I've finished it, I wonder what the point was. This could've just been another Dave book, except now we know that Clete hallucinates just as much as Robicheaux.
Does my favorite living author, James Lee Burke, have another Robicheaux novel in him? I certainly hope so, but at 87 years young, who knows. All my fingers and toes are crossed. *FUN FACT: JLB and I share the same birthday.
June 14, 2024
Any reader of the James Lee Burke’s Dave Robicheaux series knows that Dave is never far from his longtime friend and compatriot, Clete Purcel. They share a long history which include similar grim New Orleans childhoods, stints as young men in the horrors of the war in Vietnam, and police work with the New Orleans department. While Dave branched off to the New Iberia Sheriff’s Department, Clete eventually left law enforcement to become a private investigator. Meanwhile, he and Dave continued to champion the cause of good, fighting evil in many forms in that part of the South they both love and sometimes despise.
Here, in Clete, for the first time in this long running series (this is the 24fh episode), we readers experience the story from his point of view. Now, Clete is the narrator.
to be continued…..
Thanks to Atlantic Monthly Press and NetGalley for an advanced copy of this book. This review is my own.
Here, in Clete, for the first time in this long running series (this is the 24fh episode), we readers experience the story from his point of view. Now, Clete is the narrator.
to be continued…..
Thanks to Atlantic Monthly Press and NetGalley for an advanced copy of this book. This review is my own.
July 6, 2024
I have only read 7 or 8 of the books in the Dave Robicheaux series and this is #24. Thus, take my review with a grain of salt if you are one of those who diligently follows everything that James Lee Burke puts to pen.
In my opinion, the series is beginning to fall apart, and CLETE is an example of a great writer who is losing his powers. Right now, it has a 4.21 rating on Goodreads, so I may be blind to the wondrous story it tells, but as far as I’m concerned, it doesn’t tell a story at all. It is a jumble of confused and muddled ramblings, offset, periodically, by a striking phrase that displays Burke’s impressive poetic strengths. Here are a couple of great ones that caught my eye:
I felt like a boil had just formed on the lining of my stomach.
My wiring was shutting down on me from ways that I recognized from the past. It’s called agitated or clinical depression, or the dark nights of the soul.
But Burke is a poet who always had difficulty telling a linear story, and here, in my opinion, he has lost it completely. For example, fentanyl is mentioned throughout the novel as the current plague, but the story is set in the late nineties, before fentanyl became the scourge it is today. Correctly, Burke should have singled out heroin, cocaine, and/or OxyContin as the affliction tormenting Clete. Every time fentanyl was mentioned, it removed me from the timeline that we were supposed to be following.
What there is of a story consists of something (maybe fentanyl, maybe something much worse) that was accidentally hidden in Clete’s car when he took it to the car wash, and Clete’s dealings with the villains who are trying to retrieve it. People are tortured and killed. Clete joins up with Dave to attempt to solve the mystery. There are mysterious women—Burke doesn’t really understand women but he loves them so you can be sure there are several different varieties in each novel. My favourite was Gracie Lamar, but we really never get a good description of her, just tantalizing sketches.
There are ghosts, or hallucinations, of a perfect woman, who haunts Clete.
Maybe I saw illusions. Or I had nightmares. Or what Dave calls nonchemical blackouts.
We get glimpses of Dave from Clete’s point of view, to wiz:
Dave should have been a priest instead of a cop, and as a result has made a mess of his life, and people like me have had to protect him from himself.
(In the earlier novels in this series, Dave spends much of his time guarding Clete from the straits Clete gets into.)
Basically, I think that Burke can’t stop thinking, and so he must put these thoughts down on paper, even if they are repetitious and don’t form a linear story.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
My review for an earlier book in the series:
The Tin Roof Blowdown
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Thanks to the Victoria Public Library System for providing the ebook copy that I read.
In my opinion, the series is beginning to fall apart, and CLETE is an example of a great writer who is losing his powers. Right now, it has a 4.21 rating on Goodreads, so I may be blind to the wondrous story it tells, but as far as I’m concerned, it doesn’t tell a story at all. It is a jumble of confused and muddled ramblings, offset, periodically, by a striking phrase that displays Burke’s impressive poetic strengths. Here are a couple of great ones that caught my eye:
I felt like a boil had just formed on the lining of my stomach.
My wiring was shutting down on me from ways that I recognized from the past. It’s called agitated or clinical depression, or the dark nights of the soul.
But Burke is a poet who always had difficulty telling a linear story, and here, in my opinion, he has lost it completely. For example, fentanyl is mentioned throughout the novel as the current plague, but the story is set in the late nineties, before fentanyl became the scourge it is today. Correctly, Burke should have singled out heroin, cocaine, and/or OxyContin as the affliction tormenting Clete. Every time fentanyl was mentioned, it removed me from the timeline that we were supposed to be following.
What there is of a story consists of something (maybe fentanyl, maybe something much worse) that was accidentally hidden in Clete’s car when he took it to the car wash, and Clete’s dealings with the villains who are trying to retrieve it. People are tortured and killed. Clete joins up with Dave to attempt to solve the mystery. There are mysterious women—Burke doesn’t really understand women but he loves them so you can be sure there are several different varieties in each novel. My favourite was Gracie Lamar, but we really never get a good description of her, just tantalizing sketches.
There are ghosts, or hallucinations, of a perfect woman, who haunts Clete.
Maybe I saw illusions. Or I had nightmares. Or what Dave calls nonchemical blackouts.
We get glimpses of Dave from Clete’s point of view, to wiz:
Dave should have been a priest instead of a cop, and as a result has made a mess of his life, and people like me have had to protect him from himself.
(In the earlier novels in this series, Dave spends much of his time guarding Clete from the straits Clete gets into.)
Basically, I think that Burke can’t stop thinking, and so he must put these thoughts down on paper, even if they are repetitious and don’t form a linear story.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
My review for an earlier book in the series:
The Tin Roof Blowdown
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Thanks to the Victoria Public Library System for providing the ebook copy that I read.
June 29, 2024
I will leave to others to give a description of the plot. I will only mention that this story is from the point of view of Dave Robicheaux’s offsider, Clete Purcell.
It would be with some hesitation that I would recommend “Clete”to anyone who hasn’t read a few Robicheaux stories. To fully appreciate this book, you would have to be au fait with their friendship. For me, it took some time to accept Clete as the narrator and Dave Robicheaux as a suplimentary character. I am not sure how many Robicheaux stories I have read but I have been travelling on the JLB journey for many years. I always find the experience of venturing into Burke’s world of southern Louisiana challenging but rewarding. His recent novels have embraced mysticism and spiritualism. The line between realism and fantasy is often blurred. This is the case with Clete. He has visions of a young Joan of Arc who acts as his protector and savior. At times this story dances along the border between mystery and Gothic writing.
This aspect of his crime story might put off many devotees of this genre. There is a hard, gritty reality to his stories, blood and gore are an element of his work as much as any author of this genre. What sets Burke apart are the long treatises on this part of America and on the characters who occupy places in his novel.
I am surprised that I haven’t read criticisms of Burke’s world view that he filters into his work. He is definitely no card carrying GOP acolyte. I find his passing comments about America incisive and accurate.
As with many of Burke’s Robicheaux novels the dynamism of the Dave/Clete relationship is a recurring theme. “The Bobbsey Twins from homicide” have an enduring friendship. They both served in ‘shitsville’ (Vietnam) and returned with many demons. They have an unbridled commitment to each other.
Clete has a conversation with the reader which embraces social injustice, racial inequality, American neo-colonialism, and his own complex, sometimes ambivalent, feelings about the state of Louisiana.
“They wear three piece suits, start wars but don’t go to them.”
“(He) . . . cheers on wars that he doesn’t attend”
Throughout the story Clete refers to a photo of a Jewish mother and her children heading into the ‘shower block’ at Auschwitz. One of the characters, the inkman, an anti-semite, a walking grafittied character has a T-shirt with, “Six Million Are Not Enough.” Referencing the number of Jews killed by the Nazis. This plays on Crets’s mind throughout the story. He is a man of moral certainty. He plays the role of a modern knight, yet there are chinks in his armour and there are times in the novel when he suffers serious injuries. His affection for minorities, for Chen, a Chinese lady, the black women who clean the houses and mind the children of rich white people who hate blacks.
“Southern Louisiana is heaven as long as you keep one eye closed and don’t dwell on the corruption.”
“Politicians who thought putting the Exxon flag on the capital building as being reasonable”
“Our politicians are modelled on the leaders of Guatemula more than Thomas Jefferson.”
Burke has a pronounced cyncism for the politics of the South but it doesn’t come from a right wing conspiratorial base.
It is Burke’s prose style that I find as the most attractive part of his books. The characer descriptions, the imagery, the Creole slang. You get a front row seat to the violence, depravity, poverty and criminality of Louisiana.
With the ending, Burke draws on the traditional good defeats evil, there is even a shoot out and so the roller coast ride of another James Lee Burke novel reaches the finish station and this satisfied reader alights with a lingering feeling of the excitement and the beauty of the ride.
It would be with some hesitation that I would recommend “Clete”to anyone who hasn’t read a few Robicheaux stories. To fully appreciate this book, you would have to be au fait with their friendship. For me, it took some time to accept Clete as the narrator and Dave Robicheaux as a suplimentary character. I am not sure how many Robicheaux stories I have read but I have been travelling on the JLB journey for many years. I always find the experience of venturing into Burke’s world of southern Louisiana challenging but rewarding. His recent novels have embraced mysticism and spiritualism. The line between realism and fantasy is often blurred. This is the case with Clete. He has visions of a young Joan of Arc who acts as his protector and savior. At times this story dances along the border between mystery and Gothic writing.
This aspect of his crime story might put off many devotees of this genre. There is a hard, gritty reality to his stories, blood and gore are an element of his work as much as any author of this genre. What sets Burke apart are the long treatises on this part of America and on the characters who occupy places in his novel.
I am surprised that I haven’t read criticisms of Burke’s world view that he filters into his work. He is definitely no card carrying GOP acolyte. I find his passing comments about America incisive and accurate.
As with many of Burke’s Robicheaux novels the dynamism of the Dave/Clete relationship is a recurring theme. “The Bobbsey Twins from homicide” have an enduring friendship. They both served in ‘shitsville’ (Vietnam) and returned with many demons. They have an unbridled commitment to each other.
Clete has a conversation with the reader which embraces social injustice, racial inequality, American neo-colonialism, and his own complex, sometimes ambivalent, feelings about the state of Louisiana.
“They wear three piece suits, start wars but don’t go to them.”
“(He) . . . cheers on wars that he doesn’t attend”
Throughout the story Clete refers to a photo of a Jewish mother and her children heading into the ‘shower block’ at Auschwitz. One of the characters, the inkman, an anti-semite, a walking grafittied character has a T-shirt with, “Six Million Are Not Enough.” Referencing the number of Jews killed by the Nazis. This plays on Crets’s mind throughout the story. He is a man of moral certainty. He plays the role of a modern knight, yet there are chinks in his armour and there are times in the novel when he suffers serious injuries. His affection for minorities, for Chen, a Chinese lady, the black women who clean the houses and mind the children of rich white people who hate blacks.
“Southern Louisiana is heaven as long as you keep one eye closed and don’t dwell on the corruption.”
“Politicians who thought putting the Exxon flag on the capital building as being reasonable”
“Our politicians are modelled on the leaders of Guatemula more than Thomas Jefferson.”
Burke has a pronounced cyncism for the politics of the South but it doesn’t come from a right wing conspiratorial base.
It is Burke’s prose style that I find as the most attractive part of his books. The characer descriptions, the imagery, the Creole slang. You get a front row seat to the violence, depravity, poverty and criminality of Louisiana.
With the ending, Burke draws on the traditional good defeats evil, there is even a shoot out and so the roller coast ride of another James Lee Burke novel reaches the finish station and this satisfied reader alights with a lingering feeling of the excitement and the beauty of the ride.
June 23, 2024
Clete by James Lee Burke focuses on Clete Purcel, Dave Robicheaux’s loyal friend, and partner in the twenty-fourth novel of the Dave Robicheaux series.
The novel opens during the 1990s and before Hurricane Katrina and 9/11.
A lengthy review of Clete is not needed, nor required. Readers of previous novels are well aware of Purcel’s history and such a review would be unnecessarily redundant.
Only a few things needed to be described for readers and the major one is that James Lee Burke returns with another enjoyable novel in the Dave Robicheaux series, but mostly from the point of view of Clete Purcel. Like always, his craft of word assemblage never disappoints and Clete continues that on.
The story contains similar elements from previous Robicheaux novels, including mystical aspects, the devouring of the powerless by the powerful, and the eternal battle between right and wrong. There is nothing wildly new here other than the change in character perspective focus but that is not a bad thing at all. Opening a new James Lee Burke novel is like returning to that favorite, high-end steak restaurant - even though you are going to get your favorite steak you’ve had before, you still know it will be good before even that first bite.
To me, the most fascinating thing about the novel was how Mr. Burke provided an authentic, but less florally descriptive voice of Clete that still colorfully illuminated the story but in a somewhat more uncouth way.
Reading Clete would be like asking Cormac McCarthy and James Lee Burke to describe the Mona Lisa in their own, best words and that is Clete - it is so mentally visual, but in a much different way.
Loyal readers will not be disappointed and readers just starting this series will always know they will have a Clete installment to read later on.
Clete is available for purchase and is highly recommended. Netgalley provided an ARC for the promise of a fair review.
The novel opens during the 1990s and before Hurricane Katrina and 9/11.
A lengthy review of Clete is not needed, nor required. Readers of previous novels are well aware of Purcel’s history and such a review would be unnecessarily redundant.
Only a few things needed to be described for readers and the major one is that James Lee Burke returns with another enjoyable novel in the Dave Robicheaux series, but mostly from the point of view of Clete Purcel. Like always, his craft of word assemblage never disappoints and Clete continues that on.
The story contains similar elements from previous Robicheaux novels, including mystical aspects, the devouring of the powerless by the powerful, and the eternal battle between right and wrong. There is nothing wildly new here other than the change in character perspective focus but that is not a bad thing at all. Opening a new James Lee Burke novel is like returning to that favorite, high-end steak restaurant - even though you are going to get your favorite steak you’ve had before, you still know it will be good before even that first bite.
To me, the most fascinating thing about the novel was how Mr. Burke provided an authentic, but less florally descriptive voice of Clete that still colorfully illuminated the story but in a somewhat more uncouth way.
Reading Clete would be like asking Cormac McCarthy and James Lee Burke to describe the Mona Lisa in their own, best words and that is Clete - it is so mentally visual, but in a much different way.
Loyal readers will not be disappointed and readers just starting this series will always know they will have a Clete installment to read later on.
Clete is available for purchase and is highly recommended. Netgalley provided an ARC for the promise of a fair review.
June 11, 2024
I’m afraid JLB has lost a few miles off his fastball…
March 10, 2024
Clete is usually a supporting character in the Robicheaux series by James Lee Burke. This time he's in the driving seat with the first book with him as a main character. Don't worry, all the usual and unusual people in and around Iberia parish and New Orleans are there as well. Mr. Burke is probably one of the top American writers of all time. At least in my mind. I have never come across an author that can tell a tale as well as him. This book is no exception. It's southern noir at it's finest and it is a pure joy reading the books by this author. I have never been let down and I hope we all get many more like this. I can really recommend that you try something from James Lee Burke. I must thank Grove Atlantic and Netgalley for letting me read this advance copy.
May 28, 2024
I am a great fan of James Lee Burke, and the David Robicheaux series in particular, however, lately he has been dipping more into the surreal, confusing the issue with more and more other worldly elements. In this first outing in which Clete is the major character, after a strong beginning,the story dissolved for me. It does, however contain, some of Burke's trademark evocative writing, which, as always is a pleasure to read. He does manage to speak with a different voice and point of view.
December 23, 2023
I love this series. Clete is fantastic. Fans of the Dave Robicheaux series will love this story told in Clete Purcell’s voice. The writing is conversational, the story is engaging, and the characters are multi-dimensional. In the process of telling the story in Clete’s POV, we also get deeper insight into Dave in a way that only his best friend can tell it. I don’t know how James Lee Burke continues to do this.
June 19, 2024
Add a headline
Clete
James Lee Burke
reviewed by Lou Jacobs
readersremains.com | Goodreads
Another tour de force from one of today’s most iconic writers. Burke returns to his marvelous Dave Robicheaux series, but this time the main character is Dave’s quirky and beloved partner, Clete Purcel. Both grew up together in New Orleans’ Iberia Parish and went off to Vietnam, experiencing horrors that have left images permanently ingrained in their minds, never to be removed.
Clete served two tours in Vietnam and was highly decorated with three Purple Hearts, the Silver Star, and the Navy Cross, but left with a permanent scar in his heart. Both he and Dave have devoted their lives to aiding the disenfranchised, weak, and emotionally scarred. Clete has carried in his wallet for over two decades a photo he tore out of a magazine. It hauntingly shows a Jewish woman walking to the showers of Auschwitz with her three children following. He feels we can never purge the earth of those responsible and their present-day heirs. Burke weaves another epic and tantalizingly complex tale set in Louisiana’s Iberia Parish in the late 1990s.
Clete has just returned home after retrieving his beloved Eldorado Cadillac from Eddy Durbin’s Car Wash. He awakens in the early morning to a racket in his courtyard. Three low-life thugs are tearing apart his car in search of what he suspects are drugs. Did Eddy or his useless brother Andy stash some type of contraband? He ambles downstairs in his bathrobe and pink bunny slippers to confront the situation. One of the idiots actually has a t-shirt that states: “Six Million Was Not Enough.” This alone infuriates Clete. He takes all of them on in a cinematic fight scene, which unfortunately renders him unconscious after a blow to the head with a tire iron. The image of the heavily tattooed man with the crowbar is firmly ingrained in his mind. He quickly learns that the anti-Semitic tattooed man is Baylor Hemmings, a rising star in the New Rising militia group. Burke weaves into his tale a cast of flawed and colorful characters right out of Dante’s Inferno, each more odious and conflicted than the one before. Meanwhile, Clete is approached by the beautiful and mysterious Clara Bow, who wants to hire him to investigate her estranged husband’s shady dealings—not their shared involvement in a major Ponzi scheme, but his possible involvement in drug smuggling. On the street is a new drug laced with a deadly substance that could annihilate civilization. In typical Burke fashion, Clete is intermittently visited by the visage of Joan of Arc, who offers encouragement, advice, and appropriate warnings. She also apparently saves Clete’s life by offing an attacker with a long-range sniper rifle.
James Lee Burke continues to use his usual mesmerizing characters and twisted plot developments in the lush, florid setting of Louisiana. He paints a captivating tale of white slavery, corruption, women and class dominance, and the ever-present escalating drug industry. He provides thought-provoking statements that are relevant now as then. Even with his marvelous and evocative run-on sentences, the mood and imagery of the tale emerge with escalating suspense and tension. Sometimes it’s necessary to study past evils in hopes of dispelling them in the present and future.
Thanks to NetGalley and Atlantic Monthly Press for providing an Uncorrected Proof for my review in exchange for an honest review. Hopefully, Burke is not finished penning these marvelous tales.
.... Published at MysteryAndSuspenseMagazine.com ...
July 3, 2024
James Lee Burke's Robicheaux series never disappoints and Clete, the 24th in the series, is no exception. Incredibly good.
January 26, 2024
I have been reading Burke from day one but I have to say his latest seems to be a retread of so many of his other books that I’m getting bored. Of course there’s the great prose but the plot doesnt go anywhere(or make much sense) and Cleve’s dream/hallucinations wear thin after a while. Go back and read Burke’s earlier books. You’ll like them more than this one.
June 25, 2024
The author gives the reader a dark, violent and depressing storyline-to me this is very unusual with the main characters-Clete and Dave are together working. The unsettling flashbacks and devious characters made this reader quickly turn the pages. Enjoy
June 27, 2024
I ‘ve been waiting for James Lee Burke to add another book to the Dave Robicheaux Series! Clete is Book number 24. It did not disappoint! I always choose to listen to Will Patton narrate the Dave Robicheaux books. The characters come alive in my mind as he tells the story. Clete, one of my favorite characters has soooo many flaws, but he loves Louisiana and is very loyal to his best friend, Dave . They work together to deal with drug smugglers and longtime criminals. James Lee Burke and Will Patton work together to create a story you will enjoy listening to. (Content is rated “R”.)
June 16, 2024
Tiring Inner Dialogue. Too detached from reality.
I've always liked the internal thoughts of Dave and Clete, but sincerely, way over the top in this rendition. Like a silly dream. Evil poorly portrayed.
I've always liked the internal thoughts of Dave and Clete, but sincerely, way over the top in this rendition. Like a silly dream. Evil poorly portrayed.
June 24, 2024
I don’t know where to start. I eagerly anticipate every JLB DR novel and this was no exception. While I was disappointed in the last one, I felt it had to be a fluke…until Clete. It’s time to hang it up, I fear. The story was scattered, none of the characters ever really “fleshed out”, and Clete is not even Clete. Recycling stories from previous novels became tedious. Using fentanyl in a 90’s setting was weird enough, but biological warfare with a name like Leprechaun took me out. It reads like someone asked ChatGPT to write a Dave Robicheaux novel , but as if Clete was really Dave.Too many loose ends with no real conclusion to what felt like a fever dream to begin with. Will I read another new Dave Robicheaux novel if there is one? Yes because I’m committed, but I think it’s time to be done.
June 15, 2024
James Lee Burke has always lived up to the moniker ‘the Great American Novelist’ and this is apparent in everything he writes. For me, it is never more prevalent than when he is penning a new Dave Robicheaux novel.
CLETE is the latest Dave Robicheaux novel with a twist. While it features everyone’s favorite detective from the Louisiana bayou, this novel is centered around Dave’s friend and former long-time detective partner, Clete Purcel. Clete went through rough times after making some costly mistakes while on the job that cost him his role with the PD and later found him incarcerated for his involvement working with the wrong people. Dave, as true as a friend can be, rescued Clete from this fate and he now spends his days as Private Investigator who still maintains a close relationship with him.
This Louisiana story is set in the late nineties, long before 9-11, Katrina, and the recent Covid-19 Pandemic. Ironically enough for Clete, his story begins at a car wash. Clete frequently takes his lavender-pink 1959 Caddy Eldorado to Eddy’s car wash that is located across the river from New Orleans in Algiers. Much to Clete’s surprise, he steps out of his home one afternoon to find three sketchy looking thugs digging at his car in the driveway not long after a recent visit to Eddy’s. They claim that there may have been a deposit made in the vehicle while there, something quite deadly and valuable that they were sent to retrieve.
The men, one of them heavily tattooed, one wearing an openly anti-Semitic t-shirt that read ‘6 Million Are Not Enough’, and the other a typical area waster, indicate that they next will be tearing apart Clete’s home if the search of the vehicle is unsuccessful. Clete does not like this and takes the three men on. He is holding his own until the tattoo guy nails him in the head with a crowbar. When Clete eventually awakens, he reaches out to his only true friend, Dave Robicheaux --- who is currently on disciplinary leave from his Detective role for punching another cop in the men’s room, and shares the sordid visit with him.
Clete brings Dave along to meet a new client of his at the strip club she works at. Gracie Lamar is quite the tough character but has been having her hands full with a frequent guest of her club, someone known to Clete and Dave as Sperm-O Sellers. Now, in addition to this case, Clete and Dave need to get some answers from Eddy Durbin of Eddy’s Car Wash to find out why three thugs thought something might have been placed in his car at his establishment. They don’t get many answers, but can gather enough hearsay to recognize that Eddy’s is being used to distribute a powerful and expensive street drug. Clete takes personal offense to this as his niece recently overdosed on Fentanyl.
Everyone they speak with leads them to someone new. When they travel to Mississippi to speak with former Klan bigwig Hap Armstrong, he provides little except for the name of a major antisemite called Baylor Hemmings and a group movement known as the New Rising. One unfortunate thing that happens during CLETE is that each individual they meet with ends up dead shortly thereafter in some horrific manner. Clete and Dave may finally get the answers they seek when a young wannabe actress using the moniker Clara Bow wants to hire Clete to protect her from her soon-to-be ex-husband, Lauren Bow, who is a big underground mob figure in the New Orleans area. He also has been known to associate with the dirtiest scoundrels and to push deadly narcotics in his personal effort to burn the entire world to the ground.
Once Clete confronts Lauren, a target is firmly put on his own back. He also notices a heavily-tattooed gentleman working in Lauren’s backyard, something he is certain is not a coincidence. Every plot twist in CLETE ends up looking like a one-step forward, two-steps back scenario for Clete as he and the people closest to him begin to pay the price as his investigation into the deadly street drug called Leprechaun gets closer to being uncovered. Clete spends so much time in the hospital in this story as a result of different attacks upon his self that it almost becomes comical. Thank goodness he has Dave Robicheaux watching his back.
Local and area P.D. are brought into the case as well as the FBI, which clarifies for Clete and Dave just how big this case really is. No one can be trusted, even those Clete has recently become acquainted with. For him, this case is particularly personal and not just because of the alleged involvement of his Eldorado. Clete always carries in his wallet a photo of a mother and her two young children walking to the showers at Auschwitz. He takes anything seen as antisemitic very personal and this rings true as a mantra for him throughout this great story.
CLETE is everything you would want from a James Lee Burke novel. The noir style, the atmosphere of the area as thick as the humidity of the nearby swamps, and characters so fully fleshed out that they jump off the page. I hope we get more time with Clete Purcel in the future.
Reviewed by Ray Palen for Book Reporter
CLETE is the latest Dave Robicheaux novel with a twist. While it features everyone’s favorite detective from the Louisiana bayou, this novel is centered around Dave’s friend and former long-time detective partner, Clete Purcel. Clete went through rough times after making some costly mistakes while on the job that cost him his role with the PD and later found him incarcerated for his involvement working with the wrong people. Dave, as true as a friend can be, rescued Clete from this fate and he now spends his days as Private Investigator who still maintains a close relationship with him.
This Louisiana story is set in the late nineties, long before 9-11, Katrina, and the recent Covid-19 Pandemic. Ironically enough for Clete, his story begins at a car wash. Clete frequently takes his lavender-pink 1959 Caddy Eldorado to Eddy’s car wash that is located across the river from New Orleans in Algiers. Much to Clete’s surprise, he steps out of his home one afternoon to find three sketchy looking thugs digging at his car in the driveway not long after a recent visit to Eddy’s. They claim that there may have been a deposit made in the vehicle while there, something quite deadly and valuable that they were sent to retrieve.
The men, one of them heavily tattooed, one wearing an openly anti-Semitic t-shirt that read ‘6 Million Are Not Enough’, and the other a typical area waster, indicate that they next will be tearing apart Clete’s home if the search of the vehicle is unsuccessful. Clete does not like this and takes the three men on. He is holding his own until the tattoo guy nails him in the head with a crowbar. When Clete eventually awakens, he reaches out to his only true friend, Dave Robicheaux --- who is currently on disciplinary leave from his Detective role for punching another cop in the men’s room, and shares the sordid visit with him.
Clete brings Dave along to meet a new client of his at the strip club she works at. Gracie Lamar is quite the tough character but has been having her hands full with a frequent guest of her club, someone known to Clete and Dave as Sperm-O Sellers. Now, in addition to this case, Clete and Dave need to get some answers from Eddy Durbin of Eddy’s Car Wash to find out why three thugs thought something might have been placed in his car at his establishment. They don’t get many answers, but can gather enough hearsay to recognize that Eddy’s is being used to distribute a powerful and expensive street drug. Clete takes personal offense to this as his niece recently overdosed on Fentanyl.
Everyone they speak with leads them to someone new. When they travel to Mississippi to speak with former Klan bigwig Hap Armstrong, he provides little except for the name of a major antisemite called Baylor Hemmings and a group movement known as the New Rising. One unfortunate thing that happens during CLETE is that each individual they meet with ends up dead shortly thereafter in some horrific manner. Clete and Dave may finally get the answers they seek when a young wannabe actress using the moniker Clara Bow wants to hire Clete to protect her from her soon-to-be ex-husband, Lauren Bow, who is a big underground mob figure in the New Orleans area. He also has been known to associate with the dirtiest scoundrels and to push deadly narcotics in his personal effort to burn the entire world to the ground.
Once Clete confronts Lauren, a target is firmly put on his own back. He also notices a heavily-tattooed gentleman working in Lauren’s backyard, something he is certain is not a coincidence. Every plot twist in CLETE ends up looking like a one-step forward, two-steps back scenario for Clete as he and the people closest to him begin to pay the price as his investigation into the deadly street drug called Leprechaun gets closer to being uncovered. Clete spends so much time in the hospital in this story as a result of different attacks upon his self that it almost becomes comical. Thank goodness he has Dave Robicheaux watching his back.
Local and area P.D. are brought into the case as well as the FBI, which clarifies for Clete and Dave just how big this case really is. No one can be trusted, even those Clete has recently become acquainted with. For him, this case is particularly personal and not just because of the alleged involvement of his Eldorado. Clete always carries in his wallet a photo of a mother and her two young children walking to the showers at Auschwitz. He takes anything seen as antisemitic very personal and this rings true as a mantra for him throughout this great story.
CLETE is everything you would want from a James Lee Burke novel. The noir style, the atmosphere of the area as thick as the humidity of the nearby swamps, and characters so fully fleshed out that they jump off the page. I hope we get more time with Clete Purcel in the future.
Reviewed by Ray Palen for Book Reporter
May 24, 2024
I finally discovered James Lee Burke in 1990, some four books into his Dave Robicheaux series, when my favorite bookseller of all time put a copy of The Neon Rain in my hands and said "you have to take this one home with you." Thirty-four years later I've enjoyed almost forty of Burke's novels, including all twenty-four Robicheaux books, and I'm thrilled that Burke is still adding to the series. But the series addition I've been itching for for a while now is one featuring Clete Purcell, Dave's soulmate, and I finally got it.
Clete Purcell has shared most of his life's experiences with Dave Robicheaux. The two had each other's backs in Vietnam, then again as frustrated New Orleans Police Department cops, and have continued to watch over each other now that Dave is a sheriff's detective for New Iberia Parish and Clete is working as a New Iberia private detective. If one of them is in trouble, the other can be counted on to show up with guns blazing - and this time around, Clete is going to need all the firepower he can get.
Trouble has a way of finding people like Clete Purcell even if it has to find his Cadillac convertible first. Shortly after picking the Caddy up from a local car wash, Clete wakes up to find four thugs systematically taking the car apart. What they are looking for he hasn't a clue, but Clete does have a good idea about who might have stashed something in the car without his permission. Clete's grandniece died of a fentanyl overdose, and if there's anything he hates more than fentanyl, it's the people who deal it. So it's a red hot Clete Purcell who returns to the car wash to get some answers.
But it won't be that simple because before Clete even gets started a pretty young woman calling herself Clara Bow asks him to investigate her evil ex-husband. Clara pushes all the right buttons. She's exactly the type of woman Clete can never resist rescuing, even when it puts his own life in danger, so now things are certain to get a lot more complicated for Clete Purcell and Dave Robicheaux. If they don't figure this thing out quickly, it is not only Southwest Louisiana that's in trouble - the rest of the world will pay a heavy price.
James Lee Burke paints a dark picture when it comes to good vs. evil, and he pretty much always has. When it comes to portraying evilness, Burke doesn't blink - but he saves his best writing for flawed white knights like Clete and Dave. Burke believes that a few good men willing to stop evil in its tracks no matter the personal cost can impact the world for centuries to come. Dave Robicheaux and Clete Purcell are two of those good men.
Longtime readers of the Dave Robicheaux series will especially enjoy Clete because they get to experience Dave through the eyes of the man who knows him best. As powerful as this story is, I still could not help but chuckle when I realized that each of the men sees the other as the craziest and most dangerous of the pair. They both believe that the other has to be protected from himself and his urges - and both of them are correct. What a team.
Clete Purcell has shared most of his life's experiences with Dave Robicheaux. The two had each other's backs in Vietnam, then again as frustrated New Orleans Police Department cops, and have continued to watch over each other now that Dave is a sheriff's detective for New Iberia Parish and Clete is working as a New Iberia private detective. If one of them is in trouble, the other can be counted on to show up with guns blazing - and this time around, Clete is going to need all the firepower he can get.
Trouble has a way of finding people like Clete Purcell even if it has to find his Cadillac convertible first. Shortly after picking the Caddy up from a local car wash, Clete wakes up to find four thugs systematically taking the car apart. What they are looking for he hasn't a clue, but Clete does have a good idea about who might have stashed something in the car without his permission. Clete's grandniece died of a fentanyl overdose, and if there's anything he hates more than fentanyl, it's the people who deal it. So it's a red hot Clete Purcell who returns to the car wash to get some answers.
But it won't be that simple because before Clete even gets started a pretty young woman calling herself Clara Bow asks him to investigate her evil ex-husband. Clara pushes all the right buttons. She's exactly the type of woman Clete can never resist rescuing, even when it puts his own life in danger, so now things are certain to get a lot more complicated for Clete Purcell and Dave Robicheaux. If they don't figure this thing out quickly, it is not only Southwest Louisiana that's in trouble - the rest of the world will pay a heavy price.
James Lee Burke paints a dark picture when it comes to good vs. evil, and he pretty much always has. When it comes to portraying evilness, Burke doesn't blink - but he saves his best writing for flawed white knights like Clete and Dave. Burke believes that a few good men willing to stop evil in its tracks no matter the personal cost can impact the world for centuries to come. Dave Robicheaux and Clete Purcell are two of those good men.
Longtime readers of the Dave Robicheaux series will especially enjoy Clete because they get to experience Dave through the eyes of the man who knows him best. As powerful as this story is, I still could not help but chuckle when I realized that each of the men sees the other as the craziest and most dangerous of the pair. They both believe that the other has to be protected from himself and his urges - and both of them are correct. What a team.
August 28, 2024
"Dave Robicheaus said a love affair with Louisiana is like falling in love with the Whore of Babylon. I said, yeah, but what a party."
I have to say that I think James Lee Burke is one of the best writers living today. Clete is #24 in his Dave Robicheaux series, and the first one told in Clete's voice. I would recommend reading some of the earlier books in the series before reading this one, as it makes the relationships and histories clearer between Clete and Dave. Clete is a character in all of the Robicheaux books. He and Dave share PTSD from the Vietnam war, and a penchant for dealing out justice against some of the scum and lowlives....gangsters, mafia, drug lords etc.... that live in their Bayou Teche and the surrounds. Clete always has Dave's back, and Dave has saved Clete many times. Both characters are old time gentlemen with deep respect for women and empathy for the downtrodden, but both of them can cross the line when dealing with the bad guys, and both have issues with depression and alcohol.
The story opens with Clete's beloved cadillac being torn apart by members of the New Rising gang, looking for drugs that may have been hidden there. From there, Clete gets entangled with people...neo nazis and drug pushers...who think he knows where the drugs are hidden, but he doesn't. The violence in this story isn't any different than any other book in the series. For example, one of the characters finds out what Clete can do with a cement mixer and another gets thrown out of a fourth story window. People die in violent and horrendous ways, both Clete and Dave are affected by this, and as a result Clete starts seeing and hearing from Joan of Arc. The later Robicheaux books are filled with mysticism and the belief that something exists beyond what we know, and this is a great example.
I've read more than half of the Robicheaux series and am trying to read them all. Burke's other series', and stand alone short stories are just as compelling and beautifully written. His description of the skies and waters and storms of Louisiana never fail to impress me.
"Southern Louisiana is heaven, as long as you keep one eye closed and don't dwell on the corruption that's a way of life here. Louisiana is a state of mind, more like the Baths of Caracalla without the moral restraint."
I have to say that I think James Lee Burke is one of the best writers living today. Clete is #24 in his Dave Robicheaux series, and the first one told in Clete's voice. I would recommend reading some of the earlier books in the series before reading this one, as it makes the relationships and histories clearer between Clete and Dave. Clete is a character in all of the Robicheaux books. He and Dave share PTSD from the Vietnam war, and a penchant for dealing out justice against some of the scum and lowlives....gangsters, mafia, drug lords etc.... that live in their Bayou Teche and the surrounds. Clete always has Dave's back, and Dave has saved Clete many times. Both characters are old time gentlemen with deep respect for women and empathy for the downtrodden, but both of them can cross the line when dealing with the bad guys, and both have issues with depression and alcohol.
The story opens with Clete's beloved cadillac being torn apart by members of the New Rising gang, looking for drugs that may have been hidden there. From there, Clete gets entangled with people...neo nazis and drug pushers...who think he knows where the drugs are hidden, but he doesn't. The violence in this story isn't any different than any other book in the series. For example, one of the characters finds out what Clete can do with a cement mixer and another gets thrown out of a fourth story window. People die in violent and horrendous ways, both Clete and Dave are affected by this, and as a result Clete starts seeing and hearing from Joan of Arc. The later Robicheaux books are filled with mysticism and the belief that something exists beyond what we know, and this is a great example.
I've read more than half of the Robicheaux series and am trying to read them all. Burke's other series', and stand alone short stories are just as compelling and beautifully written. His description of the skies and waters and storms of Louisiana never fail to impress me.
"Southern Louisiana is heaven, as long as you keep one eye closed and don't dwell on the corruption that's a way of life here. Louisiana is a state of mind, more like the Baths of Caracalla without the moral restraint."
June 20, 2024
I'm pretty much on auto-buy for anything from James Lee Burke where his longtime hero Dave Robicheaux appears. This one was no exception, but the gimmick here is that it's narrated by Dave's hotheaded friend and partner, Clete Purcel, instead of Dave himself. This worked OK for me. Clete turns out "in his own way" to be as sensitive, damaged, and haunted as Dave is.
That said, it didn't stop the publisher from putting "A Dave Robicheaux Novel" on the front cover.
Things start out innocuously enough: Clete leaves his treasured vintage Cadillac convertible at a car wash for detailing, only to discover it being torn apart by three thugs for some reason. Why? Well, they're looking for something, and when they fail to find it, they set upon Clete, suspecting that he's got it. What could it be? We don't find out until near the end. (And it turns out to be something that only exists in the JLB universe, but that's OK.)
The usual JLB plot elements are here. Bad guys with repulsive physical features, and even more repulsive ideologies. Rich bastards seemingly untouchable by the law. Corrupt cops. Decent cops. Unlikely coincidences and accidental revelations. Protagonists put through near-unendurable pain, both psychic and physical.
And, if you know the series, you know that Dave has supernatural visions, ever since (I think) In the Electric Mist With the Confederate Dead. Somewhat surprisingly, Clete has such visions too, involving (no additional spoilers, just a hint) a maid you've probably heard of, probably appropriate for the Louisiana setting.
It gets a little weird, by which I mean a lot more weird in the thrilling climax. That's fine; at this stage, JLB has earned the right to write it whatever way he likes.
July 30, 2024
The point of view story James Lee Burke fans have been waiting for. Clete Purcel is such a dynamic and endearing character. This book was gripping, action-packed, soul-searching and contemplative. The twists with the mystical were played just right. James Lee Burke does such a wonderful job capturing south Louisiana while winding a crime story throughout. 10/10.
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