My friend Alafair Burke told me to read this book or she would stop talking to me. She was right to put the threat at that level because this is simply one of the best books I’ve read in the last ten years. Like Alafair, Attica is both a writer and a lawyer, so she really understands her material. The thing that got me right out of the gate is that the narrator is a black Texas Ranger. We don’t often see police procedurals written from the perspective of black law enforcement officers, or in the rare cases that we do, those officers tend to come across as anti-heroes. Attica takes on the racial issues at the core of this story with an unblinking eye, and the reader is all the better for her honesty. You can see why this woman has won or been shortlisted for just about every major award there is, including the Harper Lee Prize for Legal Fiction (for Pleasantville in 2016)
Winner of the CWA Ian Fleming Steel Dagger Award 20182018 Edgar Award Winner for best novelWhen it comes to law and order, East Texas plays by its own rules - a fact that Darren Mathews, a black Texas Ranger working the backwoods towns of Highway 59, knows all too well. Deeply conflicted about his home state, he was the first in his family to get as far away from Texas as he could. Until duty called him back.So when allegiance to his roots puts his job in jeopardy, he travels up Highway 59 to the small town of Lark, where two murders - a black lawyer from Chicago and a local white woman - have stirred up a hornet's nest of resentment. Darren must solve the crimes - and save himself in the process - before Lark's long-simmering racial fault lines erupt.'In Bluebird, Bluebird Attica Locke has both mastered the thriller and exceeded it. Ranger Darren Mathews is tough, honor-bound, and profoundly alive in corrupt world. I loved everything about this book.' Ann Patchett'Locke's writing is both sharp-edged and lyrical. This is thoughtful, piercing storytelling with the power to transport.' Diana Evans, Financial Times