Clete cover art

Clete

 Preview
LIMITED TIME OFFER

3 Months Free

£5.99/mo after 3 months. Cancel monthly.
Get this deal
Offer ends on 15 July 2026 at 11:59 BST.
More purchase options

Clete

By: James Lee Burke
Narrated by: Will Patton
Get this deal

£5.99/mo after 3 months. Cancel monthly.

Buy Now for £14.92

Buy Now for £14.92

In the latest Robicheaux novel, Clete Purcel - veteran, private investigator, and former New Orleans cop - takes centre stage for the first time.

Clete Purcel - private investigator, ex-member of the New Orleans Police Department, and war veteran with a hard shell and just a few soft spots - is Dave Robicheaux's longtime friend and partner in detective work. But he has a troubled past.

When Clete leaves his car at the local car wash, only to return to find it ransacked by a group of thugs tied to the drug trade from Mexican cartels to Louisiana, it feels personal - his grandniece died of a fentanyl overdose, and his fists curl when he thinks of the dealers who sold it.

Just as Clete starts to trail the culprits, Clara Bow hires Clete as a detective to investigate her scheming, slippery ex-husband, and a string of brutal deaths all link back to a heavily tattooed man who seems to lurk around every corner. Clete is experiencing shockingly lifelike hallucinations and questioning Clara's ulterior motives when he and Dave start to hear rumors of a dangerous substance with potentially catastrophic effects. The thugs who destroyed his car might have been pawns in a scheme far darker than they could've imagined.

Gripping, violent, yet interlaced with Clete's humor and consistent drive to protect those he loves, Clete brings a fresh perspective to a truly iconic series.

PRAISE FOR JAMES LEE BURKE, THE AWARD-WINNING KING OF SOUTHERN NOIR:

'James Lee Burke is the heavyweight champ, a great American novelist whose work, taken individually or as a whole, is unsurpassed' Michael Connelly

'A gorgeous prose stylist' Stephen King

'No argument: James Lee Burke is among the finest of all contemporary American novelists' Daily Mail

'The greatest crime writer currently at work' Spectator

'The reigning champ of nostalgia noir' New York Times

'Masterly' Sunday Telegraph©2024 James Lee Burke (P)2024 Simon & Schuster LLC Crime Thrillers Detective Modern Detectives Mystery Private Investigators Suspense Thriller & Suspense Witty Marriage
adbl_web_anon_alc_button_suppression_t1

Continue the series
The Hadacol Boogie cover art
The Hadacol Boogie By: James Lee Burke
All stars
Most relevant
As always JLB writes with astounding narrative skills and brings the story to life… the narrator is perfect…. But the story deteriorates and we enter a world of ludicrous fantasy where “Sir Clete “ becomes a plot too far …. Leaving the listener feeling it was time wasted .

Beautiful but ludicrous…..

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
I don't think James Lee Burke and the Robicheaux novels will be for everyone, but for me they take me to a place no other novels do. I've read them all, and would recommend reading them in order. I think his later books may split opinion, even more than the early ones. They increasingly embrace more than just the physical realm, which you can take as being in the minds of the protagonists, or something more. Burke is a writer who is concerned with the deeper questions of life and human nature, which I think touches the soul as well as the mind. His descriptions of Louisiana and the American South, the Nature, the history, the culture and the food make me long to visit. I live in the UK, so it's a long way to go, but listening to this latest novel has put it at the top of my bucket list again! This was the first Robicheaux I've listened to on Audio and I thought the reader was excellent.

Just love James Lee Burke's writing

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
I am a massive fan of James Lee Burke and Clete is a fantastic story. Will Patten truly brings both Clete and Dave Robicheaux to life with his great characterization of each player in the JLB novels and Clete does not disappoint.

Outsanding

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
JLB answers our demands for more Clete and delivers. Wonderfully read. Suspending disbelief is easy with storytelling and characters this good. More Clete please!

So good on every level.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
I've enjoyed all the Dave Robicheaux novels and Clete is a major character in the series so I was looking forward to listening to Will Patton read one from Clete's perspective. Much of the writing is of the same high standard we alway expect from James Lee Burke and his descriptive powers are as good as ever, if a little repetitive in places (there are only so many times you can hear about the live oaks and Spanish moss). I know that Clete has a troubled past and he's been affected by booze and drugs but the end of times hallucinatory scenes with Joan of Arc (yes, that Joan of Arc) I found hard to swallow. 'Sir' Clete is portrayed by Joan as 'a Knight in Shining Armour' and 'a voice for those that have none'. I'm not sure Hemingway would have approved of this over the top purple prose but that's what you sign up for with James Lee Burke and nobody does it better.
So, enjoyable in many ways but also hard to comprehend some of the more mystical elements.

'Justice and Charity'

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
See more reviews