The Demon of Unrest: A Saga of Hubris, Heartbreak, and Heroism at the Dawn of the Civil War

 

 I was surprised to find only one review of an Eric Larson book in this blog. I’ve read at least three of his ten nonfiction works including Devil in the White City and Thunderstruck, as well as Dead Wake that was reviewed by me in 5/18. Perhaps that because I read the first two before this blog was created. Frankly, I’m surprised I’ve not read more of his works which I’ve enjoyed immensely. His latest book, The Demon of Unrest: A Saga of Hubris, Heartbreak, and Heroism at the Dawn of the Civil War, which was just released this year, 2024.

 

Although I cannot claim to be a historian, my undergraduate degree was in history with an emphasis in American History. Since my graduation from college more than 50 years ago, I’ve continued to be an avid reader of this topic. In preparing for this review, I read a highly critical review of this work by Larson written by a historian and author, Alex Coe. While Ms. Coe had some reasonable comments, it seems to me that her opinions were an over-the-top attack on Mr. Larson’s work.

 

Mr. Larson began to do the research for this book even before the events of January 6, 2021, but it was watching the attack on the capital that further stimulated his writing. He himself was quite critical of current political figures who were commenting that the Civil War was not about slavery but was actually about states’ rights. However, he also clearly sensed the great angst that exists in the U.S. as the result of the current level of political turmoil. He thought that the chaos that exists now must be similar to what was occurring at the outset of the Civil War when a seemingly functioning and cooperative government exploded into a conflict of disharmony and bloodshed. He noted that there are people today who believe that a new Civil War is the only way our current conflicts will be resolved.

 

While being knowledgeable about the events that led to onset of the Civil War at Fort Sumter in the Charleston Harbor in South Carolina, I learned far more details in this book than I had read before. The book took place from the time just before Lincoln’s election in 11/1860 until Confederacy successfully captured Fort Sumter in 4/61, along with an impressive epilogue. He relied on communications between both Union and Confederate leaders and their subordinates, as well as other materials that were contemporaneously published during the same era.

 

I agree with Ms. Coe that Larson spent an inordinate length of time in describing the sexual improprieties of James Hammond, but such behaviors were not uncommon especially with regard to the sexual assaults on slaves by their owners. While Mr. Larson might not be recognized as an academic historian, and while his use of detail sometimes gets a bit tedious, he certainly provides enough information to establish his opinions. We do live in a politically troubled time, and Larson’s book is helpful in understanding some of the reasons for this level of turmoil in the country among people of radically different political perspectives who find it impossible to communicate with each other about those differences. He is not off base when he worries how we can achieve some resolution of those differences without resorting to a similar Civil War scenario.

Bone Fire

 

Bone Fire is Mark Spragg’s third novel, but the first of his four novels reviewed in this blog. I came to this book after regarding an interview with Craig Johnson, author of the Longmire series which has been very favorably  reviewed in its entirety by East Coast Don. The interview in the NY Times Book Review section indicated that Johnson was a fan of Spragg. I found Bone Fire on Amazon.

 

I’m actually surprised that I finished the book. One the one hand, it was a beautiful character study and description of Western life. On the other hand, it was very slow moving and not too interesting. There are stories of marriage and divorce, an inability of an ailing grandfather to understand his relationships, the work of a gifted grandaughter’s sculpture work, and her stepfather’s discovery of a body in an exploded meth lab. However, this was basically a boring account of subplots that seemed contrived. I cannot give this book a favorable recommendation.bone

Blood Red Summer by Eryk Pruitt

Podcasts are hot right now. Of all the genres, true crime seems to have a grip on listeners. Especially unsolved crimes and cold cases. That’s Jess Keeler’s niche. She scored big with Something Bad Wrong and is looking for her next story. Only this time she has backers footing the bill for a video series. A chance stop in a bar in the Lake Castor area matches Jess and a handsome local who’s been following her in hopes of convincing her to look into the incarceration of his uncle.

Her interest is piqued and research finds something from 1984 loosely termed the ‘Lake Castor sniper.’ During that July, four random residents were killed and a fifth was wounded. The local newspapers said nothing . . . because the killings were in the Back Back side of Lake Castor (the proverbial ‘other side of the tracks’). A local young man in his early 20s was arrested, bullied into signing a confession and sentenced to life with only the confession as proof; no trial. His mom was convinced he was possessed. But those killings stopped with his arrest.

Shortly afterward, a poker game run by the local bootlegger was crashed leaving three others killed and mutilated. One player, a local reporter, left the game early to go home and sleep it off. A stolen car was seen leaving the apartment with three passengers. The reporter was awakened the next morning by the cops, dragged to the crime scene to become a ‘person of interest.’

The reporter, Hal Broadstreet, is pissed that he has been targeted and starts in on the cops as well as the crime; he and most of the cops are at odds with each other. The next week or so, the leader of the local motorcycle gang, the Vandals, is found executed. Then another gang member is found beaten to death. A third member, assumed to have been in the car, has disappeared.

Then Hal is found shot in his home. 

Jess has culled what she can find and manages to find a couple cops from that area now retired and living on the NC-VA border. She wants to know about the sniper killings while her benefactors want her attention elsewhere. But she can’t let the sniper story die on the vine.

There’s a lot going on here: 40-year old killings, racist cops infiltrated with a few decent honest police, motorcycle gangs competing to control the routes of the East Coast drug traffic, a developing gang war (per the cops, ‘who cares if they kill each other?’), the slaughter at the poker game of a few local bootleggers who were generally decent citizens, a crusading if obsessive reporter, and a modern day podcaster tracking a story that may or may not be a sell-able product.

This is a whale of a story from Pruitt (who was favorably reviewed by yours truly a few years ago). Full disclosure: I met Pruitt at a Noir At The Bar event in Durham, NC some time back. He is a genuinely interesting and engaging fellow with his fingers in multiple pies: novelist, filmmaker, screenwriter, film festival awardee, and bar owner in nearby Hillsborough, NC. Around these parts, he is a passionate promoter of what might be considered under the radar mystery authors. He lists 5 novels; I know I’ve read another but failed to post a review. Shame on me.

I went back and read my previous (very favorable) review. I find this book to be a matured advancement over what was already a capable and keen eye for country noir. He seamlessly jumps between present day Jess and1984 Hal. 

Trust me here boys and girls. This story will capture your interest with the opening chapter. His book prior to this one is the aforementioned, Something Bad Wrong, his first Jess Keeler book. I wasn’t halfway through this book before requesting it from the library – don’t normally do that. I expect to have it next week. So watch for another Eryk Pruitt review shortly.

This 2024 copyright has recently been released so it should be easily found. He is doing a reading along with Rob Hart (Assassin’s Anonymous) and the great SA Cosby (All The Sinners Bleed) at McIntyre’s Book Store in Fearington, NC Saturday. All the books highlighted are the subject of the reading event and have been reviewed on MRB.

Yeah, I’ll be there. Count on it.

The Tin Roof Blowdown

The Tin Roof Blowdown is a 2007 novel by James Lee Burke. I learned of this particular Burke novel after reading a more recent book by Ken Bruen, one of my favorite mystery/thriller writers. The book takes place in New Orleans during and just after the hurricane Katrina in 2005. I had forgotten that less than a month later, a second powerful hurricane, Rita, struck some of the same land that had already been devastated by Katrina. 

Burke is always dependable for a good plot and great characters that will evoke strong feelings in the reader, but it is his prose that attracts me to his novels, and he is better a better writer in that regard than most authors in this genre. Once again, Dave Robicheaux was his protagonist. Much of the plot centered around Dave’s relationship with his best friend, Clete Purcel, a PI with a very checkered history who continued to consume alcohol in epic amounts. Otis Baylor and his wife were only a couple of the people that we complicating Dave’s investigation into the murders. 

Burke wrote about the power of the storms, as well as the lack of preparedness for a storm of that enormity despite the fact that everyone knew their protections were inadequate. For decades, funds that were intended to update the levy system were syphoned off to other things. The author wrote poetically about the loss of life, especially in the lowest land in the Ninth Ward. That’s where two murders took place in the immediate aftermath of Katrina when the Ninth Ward, almost entirely composed of Black poverty-stricken citizens, was left without any evidence of police. Looters were allowed to run riot. Drowned bodies were floating everywhere. 

This is one of Burke’s best efforts, and it gets my 5-star rating. There’s a new book coming out this month (6/24) entitled “Clete” and I’m putting that one on my list of must reads – I’ve already placed an order through Libby.

Sly as a Fox

 Sly as a Fox by Wendy L. Koenig is the second novel in the Sylvia Wilson Mystery series. The first novel, On the Sly, was reviewed about a year ago by another person who write for the blog, Curt Remarks, and he provided Ms. Koenig with great praise. I did not get to that book, but I just got my hands on Sly as a Fox and I didn’t put it down until it was finished. As a mystery/thriller, this second novel in the series deserves a WOW. 

Sylvia Wilson is a 24-year-old girl who is tightly attached to her brother who is one year older. She is continuing to recover from the emotional traumas which described in book one, as well as the trauma of having been kidnapped eight years earlier and then having her parents killed by a drunk driver. Even before the death of her parents, she had been a troubled youth who loved to fight even if it meant getting badly beaten up. Meanwhile, her brother was a good guy, one who did everything right. Upon the death of their parents, Sylvia and Aaron went to live with Aunt Peaches who certainly had her hands full with Sylvia.

 

When her brother, who had taken an undercover assignment with the FBI, suddenly went missing, Syl went bonkers as she joined the FBI efforts to find him. He had promised her that he would always check in with her every other day so she would know he was okay, but then she had not heard from him for four days, then eight. She refused the orders of the FBI to go home and stay away from the investigation, and Syl could tell they were not making any progress. It was only with her efforts that Aaron was found although he was being tortured by that time. She was a relentless character. The plot involved an FBI mole who was working for the bad guys, and a string of bank robberies that needed to be solved. Dead bodies were scattered about the entire story, some from Syl’s prior life, some in the present. Koenig filled out her plot with a cast of characters, both good guys and not, so the protagonist came across as a troubled but very talented and brave woman.

 

Now, I get to go back and read book #1. This is fun.