VANILLA RIDE: A Hap and Leonard Novel
Joe R. Lansdale
Knopf
Thriller
ISBN: 9780307270979
It is almost impossible to keep up with Joe R. Lansdale’s literary output. He has been at it for nearly 30 years now, starting with the novel ACT OF LOVE and a number of short stories. He has written comics (you must read his Jonah Hex story arcs, one of which demonstrated that a certain brotherly pair of blues guitarists have no sense of humor), mysteries, horror novels, action series, hardcore pornography, a children’s vampire book and westerns. He publishes stories and novels in limited editions as a matter of course, driving book collectors into fits of joy and agony simultaneously. It is not so much a matter of quantity, or the width and breadth of the territory he plows, that makes Lansdale one of the most respected authors in contemporary genre fiction. It is the consistent quality and readability of his work that have garnered him accolades from all the corners that matter.
Lansdale’s work trolls the dark shadows, the streets where the buses don’t run, and the people who live in the shadows, the ones you see but don’t sense when you lock your doors and roll up your windows. Two of his most popular creations are Hap Collins and Leonard Pine, and VANILLA RIDE is the newest installment in their mythos. As is quickly made known, Hap is white and heterosexual, Leonard black and homosexual. Each would unhesitatingly lay down his life for the other. As with almost all of Lansdale’s work, the prose is violent, dark, graphically sexual and hilariously funny, to the point that your heart almost stops while you are laughing. There is one scene in which Hap and Leonard are the unhappy objects of an unrighteous beatdown by a giant of a man who is seemingly indestructible. The account of this episode is screamingly funny and terrifying at the same time. I’m not quite sure how Lansdale manages to accomplish this, but he does --- and consistently so.
So how do Hap and Leonard arrive at this state of affairs in VANILLA RIDE? By doing a friend a favor. Marvin, an ex-Houston cop and a friend of theirs, asks them to retrieve his granddaughter, voluntarily or otherwise, from the domicile of a drug dealer with whom she has taken up residence. Hap and Leonard do so in short order and, without breaking a sweat, destroy the drug dealer’s inventory at no additional charge. Their actions upend a hornet’s nest, given that the drug dealer has ties with the notorious Dixie Mafia, a group that does not appreciate that they have caused a crimp in the “supply” end of their supply and demand quotation. Consequently, Hap and Leonard find themselves on the wrong end of a pursuit that winds up taking out part of a residential neighborhood.
The unlikely team soon realizes that the only way to get out of their predicament is to dig themselves in more deeply --- and they are given the opportunity to do just that by the FBI. A mid-level Dixie Mafia officer is ready to turn on the group, and all he wants is protection for his son, who has stolen a few hundred thousand DM dollars and run off with his underage, African-American girlfriend. All Hap and Leonard have to do is find the happy, young and unjustly rich couple, and bring them and the money back safe and sound.
The result is page after page of death, mayhem and graphic humor that you won’t shake out of your head for years. Hap and Leonard have help, of course, not only from a couple of characters named Jim Bob and Tonto, but also from Hap’s soulmate Brett, who provides immoral support from positions both across the miles and up close and personal. All of what occurs, however, only serves as a prelude to Vanilla Ride, who supplies the most dangerous and mysterious threat of all.
VANILLA RIDE contains a passel of unforgettable characters, three explosive climaxes, and enough colloquialisms and metaphors to fill a paperback dictionary and improve your church social vocabulary for years to come. Lansdale continues his trajectory, which is over the top and off the charts. Anyone who reads this book will realize they wouldn’t have it any other way.
--- Reviewed by Joe Hartlaub
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