In the Moon of Red Ponies: A Novel (A Holland Family Novel)

This is a novel by a master in top form.Beautiful and always engaging.You read and you are in the story, totally captivated.B

Excellent

4th & final book of Billy Bob series. Only wish there was a 5th book!

Billy Bob Holland is back, ghost partner and all, but now we also have Native American visions and presences. Maybe this worked better in In The Electric Mist With Confederate Dead because bayou swamps are more conducive to visions than the clear air of the mountains. For avid Burke readers, this may mark an important artistic move by the author. He may be attempting the sort of shift into psychological probing of the character as happened in the Robicheaux series as in Mist, Dave became more than just a two fisted, alcoholic ex-New Orleans cop, and Burke showed us his own and his character's history and attachment to the culture of Louisiana. I did not really like that work, but looking back I see how Burke was making a shift from merely popular to what is a Faulknerian view. Although I cannot recall which novel has the line to the effect "When I hear that song [Jolie Blonde] I could cry for the culture that is disappearing," it certainly places that series in important company. This is by way of excuse for a much lower opinion of Moon of Red Ponies. Now, I have read Burke's earlier work. Rifle toting, mountain loggers and cowboys. Out of work and out of Jail, or in. So I see he might be trying to develop his ex-Ranger hero along the lines of Dave Robicheaux; he hasn't done it yet. No sympathetic Alafair , no Baptiste, no colleagues with some understanding, just Billy Bob and his hot tempered wife against the world. If you are reading this review to decide on spending the full retail, I say go ahead if you are an experienced Burke reader and want to understand his entire corpus. If you are just starting to read Burke, however, go back and get a copy of Jolie Blon's Bounce, Cadillac Jukebox or even Last Car to Elysian Fields or maybe White Doves, hold off on this one until you are a fan.

James Lee Burke is one of my favorite authors. While his left-leaning political views don't coincide with my own, I respect the purity of his beliefs, which usually fit within his storyline, embellished by his extraordinary lyrical prose. Unfortunately "In the Moon of Red Ponies" is not up to Burke standards. Instead, "Poines" struck me as a hastily constructed effort put together only to serve as a platform upon which to hang another tired rant of government-industry conspiracy, and yet another opportunity to bash US involvement in the Mid East. This is Burke's fourth novel featuring Billy Bob Holland, lawyer and ex-Texas ranger who has taken up residence in Montana. Burke succumbs to all the stereotypes: the downtrodden Native American who nonetheless maintains dignity, honor and wisdom despite persecution from the "G", while evil takes the form of a corrupt US senator and an even more despicable corporate titan. When not raping and pillaging the Montana environment, our conspirators are scheming more diabolical ways in which to profit from the War in Iraq, while the root of Saddam Hussein's treachery is of course unveiled to ultimately be the fault of the US. Billy Bob Holland, while a vibrant and imposing character in "Bitterroot", is flat in "Ponies", wearing his continual state of indignation on his leather-fringed sleeve. While Holland shares many characteristics with Burke's Dave Robicheaux, the macho stoicism just doesn't fit a lawyer as it does the Louisiana Bayou-based cop. The most interesting character is Wyatt Dixon, Holland's vicious adversary from "Bitterroot". Dixon has been released from prison on a technicality, returning to settle the score with Holland - or so it appears. Burke's consistently talented writing skills keep "In the Moon of Red Ponies" a notch above more typical left-wing paranoia, but in the end, this convoluted tale of government deception and conspiracy just doesn't cut it. Please get back to your somewhat less controversial roots, Mr. Burke, and leave the silly propaganda to Michael Moore.