Intrigue, violence unfold in Burke’s ‘Crusader’s Cross’

There is nothing mysterious about human nature, James Lee Burke writes in his latest hard-boiled crime novel: “People are what they do.”

Here’s what detective-hero Dave Robicheaux does in “Crusader’s Cross,” Burke’s latest novel:

He loathes wealth and privilege: “The person who believes he can rise to a position of wealth and power in the state of Louisiana and not do business with the devil probably knows nothing about the devil and even less about Louisiana.”

He asserts the most evil among us are that way by choice: “I believe the causes that create them are theological in nature rather than societal. I believe they make a conscious choice to erase God’s thumbprint from their souls.”

And in fighting these monsters, he erupts into acts of violence so disturbing that he sometimes has to hide from himself inside a bottle of bourbon.

The hero of “Crusader’s Cross” is still the same noble, tortured soul we’ve come to know in 13 other Robicheaux novels, but time has brought changes as the character continues to age with his creator (who splits his time between Louisiana and Montana).

Robicheaux’s wife, Bootsie, and their home on the bayou are gone now, swept away in the violence of “Last Car to Elysian Fields” (2003). Their daughter, Alafair (namesake of Burke’s real daughter, also a novelist), is away at college.

And the family bait shop has been sold to their Cajun helper, Batist – leaving fans of the series with the dilemma of what to do with those “Robicheaux’s Dock & Bait Shop” T-shirts.

On the wrong side of 60 now, Robicheaux still is fit enough to run two miles but no longer the drop-dead favorite in a brawl. Luckily, his huge, redneck buddy, Clete, “like a unicorn on purple acid crashing good-naturedly through a clock shop,” is still around to lend a hand, along with a passel of well-drawn characters well worth meeting.

There’s Koko Herbert, the coroner, “a gelatinous, cynical man, a sweaty, foul-smelling chain smoker, given to baggy clothes, tropical shirts and a trademark Panama hat.”

And vile Val Chalons, “tall, athletic looking and blue-eyed, with a bladed face and hair that had turned silver on the tips.”

And his spectral sister, Honoria, “the redness of her mouth and the mole next to it as inviting as a poisonous flower.”

As with many of Burke’s novels, the plot turns on a long-forgotten act of evil that bubbles up from the past. This time, it’s the long-ago disappearance of a teenage hooker with whom Robicheaux’s brother, Jimmy, grew infatuated one summer.

When her name pops up in a small-town bully’s deathbed confession, Robicheaux starts asking questions – and some of those powerful people in business with the devil decide the nosy detective doesn’t need to grow any older.

The intrigue and violence unfold in the lyrical style of a writer who can never resist a vivid description of the natural world: “The barometer dropped and the sky turned a chemical green and the breakers were full of sand and dead baitfish when they smacked on the beach.”

Readers and critics who believe every crime story should be told in the spare style originated by Raymond Chandler and Dashiell Hammett hate this stuff, accusing Burke of overwriting.

But fans who have come to believe his musical prose has earned him a place of honor in the genre will find that “Crusader’s Cross” rivals the stunning “In Electric Mist with Confederate Dead” (1993) as Burke’s finest book.