Rusty Puppy, Joe R. Lansdale
Rusty Puppy, Joe R. Lansdale
List: $24.99 | Sale: $17.50
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Rusty Puppy

Author: Joe R. Lansdale

Narrator: Christopher Ryan Grant

Unabridged: 6 hr 53 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 02/21/2017


Synopsis

Hap and Leonard investigate a racially motivated murder that threatens to tear apart their East Texas town.

While Hap, a former 60s activist and self-proclaimed white trash rebel, is recovering from a life-threatening stab wound, Louise Elton comes into Hap and Leonard's PI office to tell him that the police have killed her son, Jamar.

Months earlier, a bully cop pulled over and sexually harassed Jamar's sister, Charm. The officer followed Charm over the course of the next couple of months, leading Jamar to videotape and take notes on the cop and his partner. The next thing Louise hears, Jamar got in a fight and is killed in the projects by local hoods. It doesn't add up: he was a straight A student, destined for better things, until he began to ask too many questions about the racist police force.

Leonard, a tough black gay Vietnam vet and Republican, joins Hap in the investigation, and they stumble upon the racial divides that have shaped their Eastern Texas town. But if anyone can navigate these pitfalls and bring the killers to justice, it's Hap and Leonard.

Filled with Lansdale's trademark whip-smart dialogue, colorful characters, and relentless pacing, Rusty Puppy is Joe Lansdale at his page-turning best.

About Joe R. Lansdale

Joe R. Lansdale is the author of over thirty novels and numerous short stories. His work has appeared in national anthologies, magazines, and collections, as well as numerous foreign publications. He has written for comics, television, film, newspapers, and Internet sites. His work has been collected in eighteen short-story collections, and he has edited or co-edited over a dozen anthologies.

Lansdale has received the Edgar Award, eight Bram Stoker Awards, the Horror Writers Association Lifetime Achievement Award, the British Fantasy Award, the Grinzani Cavour Prize for Literature, the Herodotus Historical Fiction Award, the Inkpot Award for Contributions to Science Fiction and Fantasy, and many others.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Dave on March 26, 2023

"Hope ain't nothing but shit misspelled." Initial Thoughts My three favourite things in the world. My daughter, my Kindle and Joe R Lansdale's magnificent Hap and Leonard saga. Not necessarily in that order either. This series is probably what the author is best known for with fifteen books a......more

Goodreads review by Josh on July 12, 2020

I've said it before and I will say it again; no one is able to rival Elmore Leonard's craft as close as Joe R. Lansdale. In fact, I'd say the two are neck and neck for the best dialogue and characterisation ever written in crime fiction. Yeah - I'm fanboying hard over this one. Rusty Puppy pits the......more

Goodreads review by Luca on March 06, 2020

Un omicidio a sfondo razziale che minaccia di far esplodere una cittadina dell'East Texas: il nuovo torbido caso per l'ormai leggendaria coppia di detective Hap e Leonard. 4 stelle ad Hap e Leonard, alle loro battute e alla loro amicizia; 2 stelle alla storia questa volta meno pirotecnica del solito,......more

Goodreads review by Wilde on May 15, 2018

Two friends investigate a death. The interaction between the main characters was laugh out loud funny in places, and the dialogue was razor sharp. Some of the social commentary was pretty moving and this was successfully interwoven with a reasonable story line. All of the characters were reasonably b......more

Goodreads review by Freda on June 16, 2017

2 long time buddies work as detectives. Funny, found myself smiling a lot. A little vulgar language, but not bad. I'm going back and reading the first of the series.......more


Quotes

"Dark, moving . . . As always, Lansdale spins a wild, rollicking yarn, but behind all the mayhem is a heartfelt tale about friendship, brotherhood, loyalty, and family. Hap andLeonard are complicated, violent men, but they display a basic humanity and decency that carries this remarkable series along."—Publishers Weekly (starred review)

"A unique mix of sly humor and horrific violence. Readers will laugh at some particularly profane smart-ass repartee and then want to cover their eyes a couple sentences later as the violence explodes. Another fine entry in a great series."—Booklist (starred review)

"The pleasure of any Hap and Leonard mystery is the yin-yang of the two heroes: white/black, straight/gay, liberal/conservative, easygoing/hair-trigger temper. Without making any brotherhood speeches, the books are rough-hewn fables of tolerance in action. Part of the reason it all goes down without any kind of 'Kumbaya' ickiness is that Lansdale writes such good smart-ass repartee. . . . This puppy tells a waggly tale the reader is happy to follow down the roughest paths."—Kirkus Reviews

"Joe R. Lansdale has a wicked way with words. Hap Collins and Leonard Pine, small-town East Texas private detectives, say the filthiest things. Some of it is good-natured banter between buddies; the rest is don't-mess-with-me trash talk. And they don't just talk dirty. They fight dirty, too. One almost feels guilty enjoying their raw, rollicking adventures. But Lansdale, an Edgar Award-winning writer from Nacogdoches, has a way of winning readers over with his deceptively elegant brand of "redneck noir."—Dallas Morning News and Ft. Worth Star Telegram

Lansdale "has a wonderfully warped way with words. In his hands, everyone can curse a blue streak and it comes out as profane poetry."—Dallas Morning News

"Lansdale has a knack for murder, though thankfully he limits that talent to the fictional adventures of crime-fighting duo Hap and Leonard."—Houston Press