Skip to Main Content

About The Book

Dave Robicheaux has spent his life confronting the age-old adage that the sins of the father pass on to the son. But what was his mother's legacy? Dead to him since his youth, Mae Guillory has been shuttered away in the deep recesses of Robicheaux's mind. He's lived with the fact that he would never really know what happened to the woman who left him to the devices of a whiskey-driven father. But deep down, Dave still feels the loss of his mother and knows that the infinite series of disappointments in her life could not have come to a good end.

While helping out an old friend, Dave is stunned when a pimp looks at him sideways and asks if he is the son of Mae Guillory, the whore a bunch of cops murdered thirty years ago. Her body was dumped in the bayou bordering Purple Cane Road, and the cops who left her there are still on the job.

Dave's search for his mother's killers leads him to the darker places in his past, and solving this case teaches him what it means to be his mother's son. Purple Cane Road has the dimensions of a classic -- passion, murder, and nearly heartbreaking poignancy -- wrapped in a wonderfully executed plot that surprises from start to finish.

About The Author

Photograph by James McDavid

James Lee Burke is a New York Times bestselling author, two-time winner of the Edgar Award, and the recipient of the Guggenheim Fellowship for Creative Arts in Fiction. He has authored forty novels and two short story collections. He lives in Missoula, Montana.

About The Reader

Photo Credit:

Will Patton’s film credits include Halloween, Boarding School, Megan LeaveyAmerican Honey, Meek’s Cutoff, A Mighty Heart, Remember the Titans, The Mothman PropheciesArmageddon, and No Way Out. He starred in Swamp Thing on the DC Universe streaming platform and was seen in five seasons of the TNT series Falling Skies. He has won Obie Awards for his performances in Fool for Love and What Did He See? He is also known for his audiobook recordings of the work of Stephen King, James Lee Burke, Denis Johnson, and William Faulkner.

Product Details

  • Publisher: Simon & Schuster Audio (August 1, 2000)
  • Runtime: 5 hours
  • ISBN13: 9780743548281

Browse Related Books

Resources and Downloads

High Resolution Images

More books from this author: James Lee Burke

More books from this reader: Will Patton