The Bayou Trilogy

Starred review from February 28, 2011
Collected in a single volume for the first time, Woodrell's three stellar novels featuring Det. Rene Shade, an ex-boxer turned cop, provide entrée into the Louisiana swamp town of Saint Bruno, a place where "tempers went on the prowl and relief was driving a hard bargain." Woodrell (Winter's Bone) injects Shade's life and various cases with both humor and brutal violence. In Bright Lights (1986), the investigation into a city councilman's murder mushrooms into a corruption scandal, with Shade feeling pressure from above for a quick—and predetermined—result. Muscle for the Wing (1988) finds Shade up against a gang of ex-cons, hell-bent on wrestling control of Saint Bruno's less-than-legal action. Shade and his two brothers—bar owner Tip and district attorney Francois—are reunited with their long-absent paterfamilias, John X., in The Ones You Do (1992), in which John X. returns to Saint Bruno with a 10-year-old daughter and a killer on his trail. There's poetry in Woodrell's mayhem, each novel—and scene—full of gritty and memorable Cajun details.

An exciting and well-crafted series of adventures takes listeners into the culture of the Louisiana Delta. It's a place one hopes doesn't exist--populated by a collection of knaves and heroes (light on the heroes). Bronson Pinchot lays the Cajun drawls on thick and the idiomatic patois thicker. His often-outrageous exaggeration of the characters works, though occasionally one has difficulty differentiating them. However, his pacing and ability to amplify the narrative line and the characters' passions are nothing short of amazing. He renders the irony and humor--some of it of a decidedly regional flavor--like a native. M.C. (c) AudioFile 2011, Portland, Maine