The Glass Rainbow

A Dave Robicheaux Novel

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The creator of “one of America’s best mystery series” (Library Journal, starred review ), James Lee Burke features Louisiana detective Dave Robicheaux in a “superlative” (Publishers Weekly, starred review) bayou thriller.

The brutal murders of seven young women in a neighboring parish pull Robicheaux from his New Iberia home into a case with all the telltale signs of a serial killer. Except that one of the victims, a high school honors student, doesn’t fit. Investigating with his friend Clete Purcel, Robicheaux confronts Herman Stanga, a notorious pimp and crack dealer—but shocking violence sends the already blood-soaked case spiraling out of control. And with his daughter, Alafair, in love with a man who has dangerous ties to a once prominent Louisiana family, every dark fear Robicheaux harbors for himself and his daughter are on the precipice of becoming reality.

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Book details:

Pocket Books |
448 pages |
ISBN 9781476726465 |
January 2013

$17.00 List Price

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Praise

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“Burke, whose sonorous cadences and obsession with the past have often recalled Faulkner, has never resembled the sage of Yoknapatawpha more closely than in this magnificent attempt to get it all down between one cap and one period.... ”

– Kirkus (starred review)

“It takes an incredible writer to keep fresh an 18th novel featuring a character that refuses to change, but Burke does so with what may be one of the best in his Robicheaux series…Burke also continues to set the gold... ”

– Library Journal (starred review)

“…Burke kicks into another gear: superb suspense leading to a gripping, set-piece finale that is a masterpiece of texture and mood, with the high energy climax in the foreground both contrasted against and supported by the... ”

– starred review

“MWA Grand Master Burke offers everything his readers expect--brilliant prose, prosaic situations that suddenly become mystic experiences, and a complex plot that repeatedly plumbs the depths of human depravity and the heights of... ”

– Publishers Weekly (starred review)

“James Lee Burke is a colorful writer… Pick any paragraph and you'll find descriptions of reds and blues and plums and obsidians piled on top of one another, giving his prose a Kodachrome vividness… the venerable... ”

– Entertainment Weekly

“James Lee Burke knows his territory.”

– The New York Times Book Review

“In crafting his novels, James Lee Burke has been nothing if not consistent when it comes to quality. Or to characters and plot. His repeated battles of good versus evil in the humid crucible of southern Louisiana are expertly and... ”

– Los Angeles Times

“A novel as dark and brooding as a night deep in the bayou.”

– The Miami Herald

“A must read for fans of the series. . . . With The Glass Rainbow James Lee Burke has once again proven his talent for creating masterful, intricate mysteries that draw the reader in. The 18th book in the Dave Robicheaux series is a... ”

– Seattle Post-Intelligencer

“Fans of The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo take note. Burke's latest Dave Robicheaux novel features a protagonist driven by moral certitude trying to find a killer targeting young women on society's margins and tangling with an old,... ”

– San Antonio Express-News

“Unlike his forebears, Sam Spade and Philip Marlowe, Robicheaux is not simply a magnetic personality on the page, one whose charisma is needed to supply the momentum to the novel. Robicheaux is an evolving, dynamic character whose... ”

– Missoula Independent

“Fans of the series shouldn't miss this one, and those new to it will be tempted to go back and look at the hero's history…you'll find an observant, intelligent examination of human behavior and motivations, wrapped in an... ”

– Columbus Dispatch

“Burke's descriptions of Louisiana's bayous, primeval forests and rural slums are poetic and pragmatic; his plot fascinating in light of the Gulf oil spill… ”

– Detroit News

“The myriad images of Louisiana run the scales: New Orleans' magic, Deep South ambience, natural beauty, endemic political corruption and demagoguery, a delicate and vulnerable coastline and the natural and man-made calamities that... ”

– Richmond Times-Dispatch

“Burke's atmospheric depictions of the topography of this steamy land meld into plot lines with fantastic lyrical sweeps . . . In Burke books lightning strikes repeatedly. The Glass Rainbow shatters in a murderous cascade of... ”

– Dayton Daily News

“Already designated a Grand Master by the Mystery Writers of America, Burke should get another title, say, for sustained literary brilliance in his Dave Robicheaux series…Once again, he combines atmospheric prose, high... ”

– Cleveland Plain Dealer

“James Lee Burke doesn't disappoint. . . . He is in top form. . . . The apocalyptic final pages of The Glass Rainbow unfold like the finale of a fireworks display, one fiery explosion after another in a seemingly endless display of... ”

– NPR.org

“Fans of James Lee Burke will not be disappointed.”

– Newark Star-Ledger

“This is James Lee Burke near the top of his crime novel game. The man can describe Louisiana, New Orleans and the human condition - even if a thoroughly debauched condition - as well as any practitioner of the genre. ”

– The Daily Record (Baltimore, MD)

“No one describes Louisiana like James Lee Burke, and this latest is compelling literary crime.”

– The Age (Melbourne, Australia)

“If James Lee Burke is not the best crime writer in the English language, he is probably the best-loved. The Glass Rainbow, his 29th novel, is as fresh and wonderful as the rest of his opus . . . The man is a maestro. . . . Be... ”

– The Courier Mail (Australia)

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Read an Excerpt

CHAPTER
1

THE ROOM I had rented in an old part of Natchez seemed more reflective of New Orleans than a river town in Mississippi. The ventilated storm shutters were slatted with a pink glow, as soft and filtered and cool in color as the spring sunrise can be in the Garden District, the courtyard outside touched with mist off the river, the pastel walls deep in shadow and stained with lichen above the flower beds, the brick walkways smelling of damp stone and the wild spearmint that grew in green clusters between the bricks. I could see the shadows of banana trees moving on the window screens, the humidity...