Title: Vanilla Ride
Author: Joe R. Lansdale
Cover Artist: Chip Kidd
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Knopf
Publication Date: June 30, 2009
I gotta say, it feels damn good to be hanging out with Hap Collins and Leonard Pine again. Not to bore the holy fuck out of your ass right off the bat, but the Hap and Leonard books were a major part of my nerdy-ass formative years. Back in the mid-nineties when I was a gangly punk in middle school, I discovered Elmore Leonard and Carl Hiaasen from a local radio personality my dad listened to in the car. After plowing through all of their books, I was at a fucking loss as to where to look next. If you’ll recall, these were the dark days before the internet made finding shit that’s like other shit easy as fucking pie.
So one day I sifted through the entire Barnes & Noble “mystery” section looking at blurbs, the most common variation for the kind of shit I liked being something along the lines of “like a Tarantino film on drugs!” or something similarly lame (come to think of it, that’s still a pretty common one out there…). Such obsessive behavior is how I came to pick up a sweet paperback of Mucho Mojo from Mysterious Press (yes, even at that age I paid attention to publishers). So you’ll forgive the Nerd if a thick fucking veil of nostalgia hangs over this fucking review, because that shit can’t be helped. Hap and Leonard were fucking life-changing.
But now that the back-story is out of the fucking way, let’s talk turkey (does anybody say that shit outside of Bogart films?) about the current book in the series, Vanilla Ride. All the things that Hap and Leonard fans expect are on full fucking display – hilariously raunchy cussing, macho male-bonding, kick-ass action, and a gleefully high body count. In other words: more of the glorious fucking same.
This time around, the East Texas duo is approached by ex-cop buddy Marvin to do a quick job. Marvin’s granddaughter is shacking up with a sleazy drug dealer and his nasty entourage out in the sticks. Hap and Leonard take it upon themselves to kick the whole crew’s ass and rescue the cracked-out damsel to boot. Also to fucking boot: Hap flushes the dealer’s whole stash. Naturally, the boys higher up on the chain – the fucking Dixie Mafia – are none too pleased about that shit and promptly send some nasty motherfuckers after Hap and Leonard. But if you’ve read any other shit from this series, you’ll know it takes more than a bunch of A.B. pieces of shit with shotguns to take down Hap and Leonard.
Like I said earlier, all the shit that makes Hap and Leonard a fucking blast is splattered across every page. The great back-and-forth between Hap and Leonard, the disgusting metaphors that pepper the descriptions, the lovingly detailed violence, the snappy pacing – all that shit is rocking at somewhere around eleven throughout Vanilla Ride. But what makes this shit especially special (man, that’s some especially special-ly bad fucking writing), is that this time out Lansdale really explores and debunks “the code” of Hap and Leonard.
Fans will note that Hap is always second-guessing his own violent actions (while Leonard by and large could give a flying fuck). He’s consistently conflicted about whether or not he and Leonard are not so much modern day John Waynes as they are heartless killers, same as the men they’re always, you know, killing. But this time out Hap’s reflections on his own nature are fucking spectacularly dire, the point brought home with a exceptionally sad and ambiguous ending. It’s so bleak, it begs the question: could this be the penultimate Hap and Leonard novel?
What I’m saying, dear reader, is that not only do you get a hefty-ass fucking (not be confused with a hefty ass-fucking) serving of good ole’ boys beating up motherfuckers, but an extra side of noir desperation thrown in for good measure as well. And if even that retarded fucking food metaphor was too confusing for you, let me set your ass straight: Vanilla Ride kicks some mean motherfucking ass.
(For purchasing information please click on the cover image above)
