January 6, 2012

Reading Great Writers – James Lee Burke for Setting

I’ve just finished James Lee Burke’s Feast Day of Fools.  It’s not a short read and it’s a violence one (no surprise, right?) but here’s the thing: you can learn so much from this guy.

I’m re-reading it now, marking things up, because he’s just so darn good at describing things.  Like the bleak horizons down on the Texas border with Mexico.  The colors, the sounds, you get the idea. 

There’s one scene, where a sociopath has taken his victim (I’m trying to avoid a spoiler here) out to his personal killing field and as the evildoer parks his “gas guzzler” and exits the car to walk back and open the truck where his victim has been tossed … well.  Not much word count, and I can still hear those boots moving, the sound of the truck opening, the barren surroundings, the breathing of the bound man.  Creeps me out. 

I’m not using his vocabulary. 

You need to read it for yourself.  Feast Day of Fools.

Amazingly good stuff.