Bluebird, Bluebird - Highway 59

Author(s): Attica Locke

Crime

Highway 59 is the forgotten route that connects the backwoods towns across the state of Texas. It's a place that time - and justice - seem to have forgotten. When it comes to law and order, East Texas plays by its own rules--a fact that Darren Mathews, a black Texas Ranger, knows all too well. Deeply ambivalent about growing up black in the lone star state, he was the first in his family to get as far away from Texas as he could. Until duty called him home. When his allegiance to his roots puts his job in jeopardy, he travels up Highway 59 to the small town of Lark, where two murders - a black lawyer from Chicago and a local white woman - have stirred up a hornet's nest of resentment. Darren must solve the crimes - and save himself in the process - before Lark's long-simmering racial fault lines erupt. A rural noir suffused with the unique music, color, and nuance of East Texas, Bluebird, Bluebird is an exhilarating, timely novel about the collision of race and justice in America. The first in a blockbuster series set along Highway 59, history casts a long shadow in this high-stakes, small town thriller.


Product Information

The first novel in a thrilling, timely new series about the cost of justice in the American South

In Bluebird, Bluebird Attica Locke had both mastered the thriller and exceeded it. Ranger Darren Mathews is tough, honor-bound, and profoundly alive in corrupt world. I loved everything about this book -- Anne Patchett, author of Commonwealth Attica Locke knows Texas, a place that has shaped both her characters and her life. Locke's new book, Bluebird, Bluebird, is evidence of her deep knowledge and love of her community and a deep talent for writing hype thrillers that also manage to be timely, relevant and keenly insightful. -- Joe Ide, author of IQ and Righteous Bluebird, Bluebird has the impeccable pacing, memorable characters, and deepening sense of mystery and dread we expect in the finest noir thrillers. But this is so much more. Attica Locke has written a marvelous novel. -- Ron Rash, author of The Risen Attica Locke is a must-read author who writes with power, grace, and heart, and Bluebird, Bluebird is a remarkable achievement. This is a rare novel that thrills, educates, and inspires all at once. Don't miss it. -- Michael Koryta, author of Rise the Dark Attica Locke knows how to tell a tale, her voice so direct and crisp that the dust from the side of Highway 59 will settle on your hands as you hold Bluebird, Bluebird. Nothing comes easy in Shelby County, where the lines between right and wrong blur a little more with each heartfelt page, and love and pain live together as one under the big Texas sun. -- Michael Farris Smith, author of Desperation Road and Rivers With Bluebird, Bluebird Attica Locke brings freshness and vitality to a beloved form. Her storytelling touch is just so strong! From the first beautifully done scene until the finale, this is a very propulsive novel concerning old deeds that keep influencing the present, injustice and courage---a powerful and dramatic look at contemporary black life in rural America. -- Daniel Woodrell, author of The Maid's Version Attica Locke's Bluebird, Bluebird reads like a blues song to East Texas with all its troubles over property, race, and love. Taut where it has to be to keep a murder investigation on its toes, this novel is also languid when you need to understand just what would keep a black woman or man in a place where so much troubled history lies. This novel marks Love's (and Hatred's) comings and goings amongst black and white, and all the shades between. Locke's small town murder investigation reveals what lies at the heart of America's confusion over race. -- Walter Mosley, author of Down the River unto the Sea This is Attica Locke's best work yet-and if you've read Pleasantville you know that's saying something. Just by her choice of protagonist (an African American Texas Ranger, tacking between two worlds as he solves a double homicide) you know Locke is a writer who makes bold choices, and whose fiction is powerfully connected to our troubled world -- Ben Winters, author of Underground Airlines Praise for Pleasantville: 'Ambitious, socially committed and beautifully written ... the next time you find yourself in the company of a crime reviewer, don't bother asking who you should be reading. You know the answer: Attica Locke. -- Barry Forshaw * Independent * An excellent thriller ... a gripping blend of the personal and the political * Irish Times * As convincing as it is enthralling. -- Boyd Hilton * Heat * Genuinely unnerving ... subtle, complex questions of identity, family and history * Daily Mail * Outstanding...Locke just gets better and better as a writer. -- Jake Kerridge * Sunday Express Magazine * Her best story yet. -- Mark Lawson * Guardian * It's a fascinatingly complex setting and Locke maps it with great skill, charting the struggles of her characters as the crime remains unsolved ... a smart legal thriller about how far people will go to gain power, and keep it. -- Jeff Noon * Spectator * A common selling point for the sorely missed HBO series "The Wire" is that it's the closest television has ever come to feeling like a novel. Attica Locke'sPleasantville is that novel. * Washington Independent Review of Books * In Pleasantville, Attica Locke returns to Jay Porter, the black lawyer hero of her magnificent first novel, Black Water Rising. This one is just as good. -- Marcel Berlins * Times *

Attica Locke is a screenwriter who has written for Paramount, Warner Bros, Twentieth Century Fox, HBO and Dreamworks; she currently contributes to the hit show Empire. Locke's first novel Black Water Rising was shortlisted for the Orange Prize, nominated for an Edgar Award, an NAACP Image Award and a Los Angeles Times Book Prize. Her most recent book, Pleasantville, was published in 2015. A native of Houston, Texas, Attica lives in Los Angeles, with her husband and daughter.

General Fields

  • : 9781781258965
  • : Profile Books Ltd
  • : Serpent's Tail
  • : 0.48
  • : May 2017
  • : 234mm X 153mm
  • : United Kingdom
  • : October 2017
  • : books

Special Fields

  • : Attica Locke
  • : Paperback
  • : Export
  • : en
  • : 320