2008-10-02 Middling

Dave Robicheaux and Clete Purcell are their usual selves in James Lee Burke's latest novel, but they seem spread too thin against the landscape of Montana: I look forward to their return to the claustrophobic and humid parish of New Iberia.
Swann Peak is Burke's most uneven novel for some time. The characters are as vivid and morally ambivalent as always, but much as I wanted the plot twists to be sublime, they were too often ridiculous.
I'm left with the impression perhaps of a tired author who is drawing breath after the remarkable Tin Roof Blowdown; and certainly of an author who is capable of much better.