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A review by misterjay
Mucho Mojo by Joe R. Lansdale
4.0
Like a lot of thrillers, Mucho Mojo starts with a body. Leonard Pine's uncle Chester has died and he enlists the support of his friend Hap Collins to help him go through Chester's things. Things are going well until the pair of friends make a gruesome discovery in a box beneath Chester's house. The resulting investigation into the box's contents, how they got there, and why make for an intriguing mystery.
Mucho Mojo starts off slow, letting the setting (east Texas) and season (summer) build in the readers mind as Hap and Leonard interact with the community in which Uncle Chester lived. They meet the drug dealing thugs in the house next door and the kindly old lady across the street. They get involved with a lawyer and the police and church officials. As the story progresses, each of these characters is shifted onto one side or the other until a clear division of who is siding with Hap and Leonard and who is siding against them can be seen. That's when the story kicks into high gear, with plenty of fights and revelations along the way.
The slow boil of a plot does the novel a great service in allowing the setting and characters to be fully realized. At the same time, there is a lot of time given over to Hap's internal dialogue and how he is feeling that particular day. These monologues about the women he's been with and how life has lead both him and Leonard to this point can get a little tedious, making the reader wish for another fight or at least more of the banter between Hap and Leonard instead.
Because it is the banter between these two life long friends, one white and straight, the other black and gay, that makes the novel shine. Hap's wit and creative use of the language is contrasted with Leonard's dry, sarcastic humor to show the deep affection between them even through their words are little but insults and put downs littered with rural metaphors and aphorisms.
A last note about the edition I "read": The Audible edition of the book is read by Phil Gigante. Mr. Gigante gives Hap a slow drawl and Leonard a deep growl that provide a welcome dimension to the already well written characters. It appears that Mr. Gigante has read all seven of the Hap and Leonard books currently available from Audible; I look forward to listening to them all.
Mucho Mojo starts off slow, letting the setting (east Texas) and season (summer) build in the readers mind as Hap and Leonard interact with the community in which Uncle Chester lived. They meet the drug dealing thugs in the house next door and the kindly old lady across the street. They get involved with a lawyer and the police and church officials. As the story progresses, each of these characters is shifted onto one side or the other until a clear division of who is siding with Hap and Leonard and who is siding against them can be seen. That's when the story kicks into high gear, with plenty of fights and revelations along the way.
The slow boil of a plot does the novel a great service in allowing the setting and characters to be fully realized. At the same time, there is a lot of time given over to Hap's internal dialogue and how he is feeling that particular day. These monologues about the women he's been with and how life has lead both him and Leonard to this point can get a little tedious, making the reader wish for another fight or at least more of the banter between Hap and Leonard instead.
Because it is the banter between these two life long friends, one white and straight, the other black and gay, that makes the novel shine. Hap's wit and creative use of the language is contrasted with Leonard's dry, sarcastic humor to show the deep affection between them even through their words are little but insults and put downs littered with rural metaphors and aphorisms.
A last note about the edition I "read": The Audible edition of the book is read by Phil Gigante. Mr. Gigante gives Hap a slow drawl and Leonard a deep growl that provide a welcome dimension to the already well written characters. It appears that Mr. Gigante has read all seven of the Hap and Leonard books currently available from Audible; I look forward to listening to them all.