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iam_griff's review against another edition
3.0
This is a bittersweet review as I finish the last novel in the Burke series. I’ve truly enjoyed this dark & gritty journey that Andrew Vachess created. I haven’t enjoyed the last couple of books as I did the first dozen, but have grown to love the characters in this series Burke, Pansy, Michelle, Max the Silent, the Prof., the Mole, & Mama that have been in the books since the beginning & characters like Clarence, Terry, Rosy & the Gate Man that came along in later books. I’m a bit disappointed as there wasn’t much of an epilogue to the book or the series.
This is my second run through the series & still enjoy it immensely.
This is my second run through the series & still enjoy it immensely.
rleigh78's review against another edition
4.0
Bye bye, Baby Boy Burke. I'll miss you and the Family.
grandgranini's review against another edition
3.0
Apparently, this is the last Burke novel. I haven't read any of these in a while, but not much has changed: Burke listens to blues, has cryptic conversations with a variety of people, and gets a new dog.
delmama's review against another edition
2.0
I was really disappointed with this book . I am a huge Andrew Vachss fan but I can't give this a better review, Burke deserved a better ending.
delmama's review against another edition
2.0
I was really disappointed with this book . I am a huge Andrew Vachss fan but I can't give this a better review, Burke deserved a better ending.
dustymantle's review against another edition
2.0
Not a bad book, or a badly written one, but not one that was really to my taste, for the same reasons as the last Vachss I read.
jan603dd's review
3.0
It's a testament to the power of Burke that this read like a parody. Burke slashes his hand through the air to cut people off enough to give himself RSI and more fist-bumps and hi-fives are given out than at your average basketball game - assumption for comedic effect: never been to a basketball game.
The book was one long lecture and if this had been the first Burke book I read, it would have also been the last, but no, it was just the last and the last. For real. As the prof might have said "what you say don't play, you gotta do to make it true" and Bourke doesn't really do a lot.
18 books is a fair whack and there were some gems in there, but ultimately I'm glad the whole thing's over and I think Burke is too. Poor guy was as tired as we were and it showed.
The book was one long lecture and if this had been the first Burke book I read, it would have also been the last, but no, it was just the last and the last. For real. As the prof might have said "what you say don't play, you gotta do to make it true" and Bourke doesn't really do a lot.
18 books is a fair whack and there were some gems in there, but ultimately I'm glad the whole thing's over and I think Burke is too. Poor guy was as tired as we were and it showed.
brettt's review
3.0
Another Life is the 18th and final book in Andrew Vachss' series about Burke, a career criminal and con-man who's spent some time as a mercenary and an unofficial private investigator. It continues Vachss habit of unhitching his books' messages from their stories. They weren't woven together, and the sermonic monologues in different character's mouths make for a stumbling read. Vachss hasn't helped matters by using these passages to preach on whatever personal position he had about anything. Terminal, for example, offers his thoughts on the real cause of Iraq war, but absolutely no reason why I should care what a child advocacy lawyer thought about it.
Another Life offers some more of the same. You'll be glad to know that Eric Clapton is really not much of a blues musician. We also learn how those Nigerian e-mail bank account scams work, which is indeed shocking news in a book published in 2008. It also features one of Vachss' other annoying habits, the recycling of several pages from earlier books verbatim by way of flashback. Burke and his family of choice are given the task of finding the kidnapped infant son of a Saudi prince. Their client: The mysterious Pryce, who offers them the task in exchange for medical treatment for one of their own, critically wounded and likely to die. If they're successful, Pryce will also see they have a clean slate with the law, a chance at "another life."
NOTE: THE NEXT PARAGRAPH IS KIND OF SPOILER-ISH. SKIP IT IF THAT MATTERS TO YOU!
Longtime Burke readers might hope that Vachss could wind up some different storylines he's spun out over the years. Burke has had romantic involvements with several good women who might have offered him a path out of his criminal life, especially if his slate is wiped clean. A few of them have lingered across most of his career. But none of them even appear in the book, let alone cross his path. Vachss does toss us the bone of giving Burke a new dog to replace his beloved Pansy. He also, by virtue of a therapy ex machina session with a counselor he'd dealt with before, hammers out some personal issues that have troubled him his whole life. They're wrapped up in a weekend.
Vachss intends to continue writing, so I guess we'll see if the tendency to preach his plots instead of plot his preaching developed because the Burke characters were too well-set for him or for some other reason. Until then, happy trails to Burke, who's earned his rest.
Original available here.
Another Life offers some more of the same. You'll be glad to know that Eric Clapton is really not much of a blues musician. We also learn how those Nigerian e-mail bank account scams work, which is indeed shocking news in a book published in 2008. It also features one of Vachss' other annoying habits, the recycling of several pages from earlier books verbatim by way of flashback. Burke and his family of choice are given the task of finding the kidnapped infant son of a Saudi prince. Their client: The mysterious Pryce, who offers them the task in exchange for medical treatment for one of their own, critically wounded and likely to die. If they're successful, Pryce will also see they have a clean slate with the law, a chance at "another life."
NOTE: THE NEXT PARAGRAPH IS KIND OF SPOILER-ISH. SKIP IT IF THAT MATTERS TO YOU!
Longtime Burke readers might hope that Vachss could wind up some different storylines he's spun out over the years. Burke has had romantic involvements with several good women who might have offered him a path out of his criminal life, especially if his slate is wiped clean. A few of them have lingered across most of his career. But none of them even appear in the book, let alone cross his path. Vachss does toss us the bone of giving Burke a new dog to replace his beloved Pansy. He also, by virtue of a therapy ex machina session with a counselor he'd dealt with before, hammers out some personal issues that have troubled him his whole life. They're wrapped up in a weekend.
Vachss intends to continue writing, so I guess we'll see if the tendency to preach his plots instead of plot his preaching developed because the Burke characters were too well-set for him or for some other reason. Until then, happy trails to Burke, who's earned his rest.
Original available here.
scotchneat's review
1.0
Not my style of detective novel - disjointed writing and a very staccato version of what philosophical thugs are meant to be.
Never really got into it.
Never really got into it.
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