The Tin Roof Blowdown: A Dave Robicheaux Novel
Series: Dave Robicheaux, Book 16
By: James Lee Burke / Narrated By: Will Patton
Length: 13 hrs and 3 mins
What can I say? Will Patton will knock your socks off!!!
Not that James Lee Burke’s writing isn’t engaging or anything, but Will Patton? WOW!!! I was absolutely blown away by his narration. I can’t think of when I’ve heard somebody who can do sooo many voices, accents, switch between characters sooo effortlessly, infuse the text with excitement and emotion. All without the excessive verbal gyrations of a person trying too hard. Seriously, I mean it: Effortless!
Drawls, Cajuns, Blacks, Southern Whites, Creoles, men, strong women, psychopaths, teenagers, the elderly… I can go on and on. And trust me, for a 13 hour book, the list goes on and on.
Which I s’pose is a nice and clever way to segue into: There are a LOT of threads going on here in The Tin Roof Blowdown. Don’t kill me if I admit that it’s only my second Dave Robicheaux book (And in this one, ‘twould appear that he’s now with a THIRD wife?), but it’s got Hurricane Katrina in it, see?
And what I remember about Burke and Robicheaux is that the environment and events become characters in their own right. You can feeeel the sultry heat; you can feeeel the utter chaos! Sure, there are terrific people like the most lowbrow “Knight Errant” in the hard-drinking, fist-swinging, utterly loyal Cletus. There’s the strong and smart adopted daughter, “Stop-Calling-Me-Alf” Alafair. And in this, Book 16, there are amateur, run-of-the-mill thieves/rapists, smarmy and plotting psychopaths, MS-13 gang members, a mafia-type guy who just miiiight have ties to Al-Qaeda, a dad with a trigger-finger who may’ve gunned for looters… You name ‘em, this book’s got ‘em!
The story opens with Katrina moving on, and Dave Robicheaux thinking New Orleans has dodged The Big One. Everybody who didn’t, or couldn’t, evacuate lucked out. So all those nightmares of Vietnam he keeps having? Well, in his dreams is the ONLY place he’ll have to face terror and devastation.
Nope.
The levees break, and chaos reigns supreme. Good people turn looter, scared people turn murderer. Oh, and did I mention there are “blood diamonds” in the story also? Sorry, it slipped m’ mind, but looters turned thieves-extraordinaire stumble on drugs, money, and blood diamonds. And that sets up a whole other thread in this massive tale of exploits and bad guys and good guys doing the best they can in unimaginable circumstances. Robicheaux has to find the bad guys, yes, but in this story, he has to fight for his family too (I dunno: Does he have to fight for his family in all the other books too? Maybe it gets old at this point in the series, but I liked the family so much that I was utterly engaged!).
So many stories going with so many characters, in another writer’s hands, might get to be a bit much. And, honestly? I still don’t know how the priest figured into all of it… But for the most part, this is a well-written book with a heavenly sense of place and a hellish sense of character—You just don’t know whom to trust. And that’s pretty darned exciting.
As a book it’s good, yes. But as an audiobook, Oh. My. GOD. It’s fanTAStic. Do NOT miss out on Will Patton’s narration. I recently discussed his narration with a friend who’s listened to other Dave Robicheaux audiobooks, and we stirred ourselves up into a veritable tizzy, I tell you. So it’s not just me.
So there!!!
As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases.