‘His most gripping thriller to date.’ Mirror
Hurricane Katrina has transformed New Orleans into a violent wasteland. Criminals capitalise on the devastation as survivors wait for help that never comes.
David Robicheaux – his city in ruins — is tasked with investigating the murder of a pair of looters: is it a simple case of ‘stand-your-ground’, or something altogether darker? The dead men’s accomplice holds the key but he has disappeared to escape the people hunting him.
As Robicheaux uncovers a brutal catalogue of greed, torture and murder, his own family is threatened, and the ravaged city provides the perfect stage for a final confrontation between good and evil.
‘A beautifully written howl of rage.’ Time Out
Hurricane Katrina has transformed New Orleans into a violent wasteland. Criminals capitalise on the devastation as survivors wait for help that never comes.
David Robicheaux – his city in ruins — is tasked with investigating the murder of a pair of looters: is it a simple case of ‘stand-your-ground’, or something altogether darker? The dead men’s accomplice holds the key but he has disappeared to escape the people hunting him.
As Robicheaux uncovers a brutal catalogue of greed, torture and murder, his own family is threatened, and the ravaged city provides the perfect stage for a final confrontation between good and evil.
‘A beautifully written howl of rage.’ Time Out
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Reviews
The story, about greed and murder and redemption, contains some of Burke's most brilliantly realised characters ... a compelling and moving narrative, punctuated by his devastating descriptions of the ravaged city
THE TIN ROOF BLOWDOWN is the novel James Lee Burke was born to write. His imagination has always tended to the apocalyptical - but Hurricane Katrina outdid his worst inventions ... The passages describing the actual flooding are tremendously powerful but Burke also weaves a fully satisfying story into this extreme event
THE TIN ROOF BLOWDOWN is more than a crime novel; more than a literary novel even. It is a work of profound historical value and importance ... To say I enjoyed this book is an understatement ... there were moments when I wanted to put the book down, it was so painful to continue. But I couldn't. Nor, I dare say, will anyone else
You feel guilty for enjoying it so much ... a great piece of art has come out of human trouble ... it is his greatest novel
Brutal, lyrical and brilliant
James Lee Burke is one of our finest writers of crime fiction
Probably his finest novel ... it's quite an achievement to make the 16th novel in a series a personal best, but it's more than that - it stands comparison with the best of Southern fiction
This New Orleans looks like Bosch and reads like Ballard ... it's worth emphasising that no 'literary' novelist has performed this task of imaginative witness to disaster yet. And none will do it half so well as Burke. ... he proves more forcefully than ever that he can dive down these mean - or drowned - streets and strike both a tragic, and epic, note
THE TIN ROOF BLOWDOWN is, inevitably, sadder and angrier than previous Robicheaux novels. We always knew James Lee Burke was a master craftsman of the crime genre. This proves him to be more than that
This crime writer wears Faulkner's mantle now
In the US, he's often regarded as the crimewriter's crimewriter. But that was before Hurricane Katrina ripped the soul out of Burke's beloved New Orleans and inspired him to write what has to be his most gripping thriller to date ... Burke's descriptions, especially of the aftermath of the hurricane, are more vivid and powerful than any piece of reportage I've yet to come across
A beautifully written howl of rage and pain over the disaster - social, political, human - that was Hurricane Katrina ... Burke has crafted a killer mystery and a passionate tribute to to his beloved New Orleans
