Heaven, My Home

Implicated in the murder of a white supremicist Texan Ranger Darren Walker is happy to accept a desk job to keep his marriage intact. However when the son of an imprisoned member of the Aryan Brotherhood of Texas goes missing Walker is forced to join the investigation. The boy's family is big in Jefferson Texas and as Walker investigates he realises that there are bigger forces at play.
As ever with Locke's books there are layers upon layers. On the surface is a straightforward procedural about a missing boy with the undercurrents of corruption. However what sets these books apart is the treatment of racism in everyday life in the Deep South, here also intertwined with the treatment of Native Americans. Nothing is ever completely solved, show more there aren't any neat finishes and this confidence is marks Locke out as a special writer. show less

When nine-year-old Levi King goes missing in Jefferson in east Texas, Darren Matthews is sent to look into the case. As a black Texas Ranger, Darren seems an odd choice since Levi is the son of BIll King, a prominent member of the notorious Aryan Brotherhood of Texas(ABT) who is in prison for murder. But for some reason, Bill had requested Darren specifically and it is hoped that, by Darren being part of the investigation, he can convince King to confess to another killing. Darren is not sure he wants to help find the boy since he has already shown signs of sharing his father’s racism but he has his own reasons for becoming involved - reasons that make it imperative he gets King’s confession because Darren is being blackmailed for show more his own actions related to the murder and by his own mother.

Heaven, My Home is the second book in the Highway 59 series by author Attica Locke and it is one hell of a compulsive read. It follows right after the events that took place in Bluebird, Bluebird, the first book in the series and, although it isn’t necessary to have read this, it certainly helps because much of the action in Heaven is the result of what happened in Bluebird. Heaven also takes place right after the 2016 election of Trump and the rise of racism and the lack of desire to pursue cases against white supremacists by the new administration play a significant role in the story.

Heaven, My Home is a well-written, well-plotted, and completely engrossing mystery. it is a complex tale and Darren makes for a flawed but sympathetic protagonist. The story is somewhat pessimistic but, given the state of the nation right now, it is a fair assessment and depiction of politics under Trump. It grabbed my attention from the first page and kept it throughout. If I were to make a list of the best books I have read this year, Heaven, My Home will definitely be near if not at the very top of the list. The story ends with several unresolved issues suggesting there will be at least one more book in the series and I am already looking forward to see where the next installment takes us.

Thanks to Netgalley and Mulholland Books for the opportunity to read this book in exchange for an honest review show less

This is the second instalment in the Highway 59 series; readers would be advised to read Bluebird, Bluebird before picking up Heaven, My Home since there is a great deal of overlap and the latter takes place shortly after the end of the former.

Darren Mathews is a black Texas Ranger who is sent to Jefferson in east Texas because a nine-year-old boy has gone missing. Levi King is the son of Bill “Big Kill” King, a prominent Aryan Brotherhood of Texas (ABT) member currently imprisoned for drug charges. Mathews’ task is not so much to assist in the search for Levi but to learn anything about the ABT which could be used in an indictment against the organization. Many people think that Levi was killed, and Leroy Page, a black man, soon show more becomes the main suspect. Darren is not convinced and tries to uncover what really happened to Levi.

The novel is set just after the 2016 election of Donald Trump. There is concern that the incoming administration will have little interest in pursuing charges against white supremacists so there is an urgency to getting as much information about the ABT as quickly as possible. There are repeated references to the election: Darren “marvelled with befuddled anger at what a handful of scared white people could do to a nation . . . white voters had just lit a match to the very country they claimed to love – simply because they were being asked to share it.” There is also repeated reference to a spike in racial violence in the wake of the election: “There had been more than fifty incidents of hate-tinged violence across the state in the four weeks since the election.”

Darren regularly faces racism, even when he is wearing his badge. Some of the incidents are difficult to read. What is interesting is that Darren has ingrained prejudices of his own. He admits to having “blind spots when it came to black folks, the feelings of deference that shot up through him like roots through fertile soil – the instinct to protect and serve that came over him around black folks, especially those of advanced age, men and women whose challenges and fortitude had made Darren’s life possible.” He tends to equate all older blacks with his uncles who raised him and “were men of truth, in all things.” Unfortunately, Darren’s biases mean that he is not always able to be objective.

Darren is a complicated and flawed protagonist. His personal life is in turmoil; his relationships with his wife, mother, uncle, and best friend are all in upheaval. He wants to remain loyal to his upbringing, profession, and spouse, but struggles. His decision to protect a black man in Bluebird, Bluebird means he has broken the law and so put his career in jeopardy. He has also left himself open to blackmail. He finds himself asking “Could there ever be honour in lying” and feeling “unsure of who he was half the time or what he believed.”

The book is rather pessimistic. Darren is hopeful about Levi if he is found alive, not convinced that his future can “be divined from the leaves of his family tree,” but others imagine that if he is alive, he will, in short time, become “a homegrown terrorist” and “a man-child with SS bolts inked on his wrist.” Darren actually admits that his job has left him pessimistic that “the Brotherhood and what it stood for would ever truly be eradicated. There were too many of them; in tattoos or neckties, they were out there. Everywhere. The country seemed to grow them in secret, like a nasty fungal disease that spread in the dark places you don’t ever dare to look.” Also ominous is Darren’s comment: “’Can’t have all the hate talk out there and it not end up in violence some kind of way. It’s just human nature. You talk it enough and it carves out a path of permission in your heart, starts to make crazy shit okay.’” Considering the recent mass shooting in El Paso, this comment resonates with truth.

There are many unresolved issues at the end of the book, so I can only assume that there will be another book in the series. I do not always like Darren’s choices, but I have empathy for him and so want him to be able to extricate himself from his dilemmas. I will definitely be looking for the next instalment.

Note: I received a digital galley of this book from the publisher via NetGalley.

Please check out my reader's blog (https://schatjesshelves.blogspot.com/) and follow me on Twitter (@DCYakabuski). show less

I really enjoyed this installment in the Highway 59 series (so far, it's only two books). Texas Ranger Darren Matthews heads into bayou territory of east Texas to look into the disappearance of a 9-year-old boy. But really, he is hoping to get dirt on the Aryan Brotherhood of Texas. Darren is African-American and Locke very effectively weaves the dynamics of a Black lawman in deep white supremacy territory into the story. Character development is one of Locke's strengths: Darren is a flawed hero and his flaws are so humanly complicated and understandable. The author also captures the setting effectively. As one who grew up in the south, I appreciated the descriptions of Pine woods and Cypress swamps. I liked this one even better than show more its predecessor; definitely a worthwhile series. show less

Darren Matthews is in all kinds of trouble. His marriage is a shaky alliance dependent on his good behavior. He's trying to placate his estranged and difficult mother, who holds a key piece of evidence that could get a friend convicted of murder and cost him his job as a Texas Ranger. Darren is unhappily stuck in at a desk poring over digital surveillance and chatroom logs of the local Aryan Brotherhood for a joint task force of state and federal investigators. Then he's chosen to assist a sheriff to investigate the disappearance of a nine-year-old boy who lived in a ramshackle trailer camp beside Lake Caddo.

It's a sensitive case. The boy's family is involved in the Aryan Brotherhood of Texas, and they're fighting amongst themselves, show more ripe for spilling secrets. The case the joint task force has been building against the group is close to yielding convictions after years of work, but Donald Trump has just been elected, and the feds' priorities might be changed. The local sheriff could use the help of a black Texas Ranger, since the land occupied by the white supremacist camp belongs to Leroy Page, the last of a line of free blacks who established Hopetown after emancipation. Though the family of the missing boy will object to his involvement, Darren can go places and ask questions that a white officer couldn't.

But things are more complicated than he expected. Page is the last person to have seen the boy alive, and he becomes a suspect. The FBI wants to make an example of him. If they charge him with a hate crime, it will prove to the incoming administration that they can investigate hate crimes with an even hand. And Page, who is in the process of selling his land to a shady developer, doesn't see Darren as an ally.

As in the first book in this series (BLUEBIRD, BLUEBIRD), the East Texas location is vividly drawn: the antebellum nostalgia tourism of Jefferson, the hidden community of Hopetown, where a family of Caddo Indians has lived in harmony with African Americans for generations, the vast, spooky lake where the boy disappeared, full of cypress swamps and bayous.

Darren's location in this landscape is also vividly drawn. Raised by two uncles, one a lawman and the other a civil rights lawyer, he embodies a conflict that divided them, whether to forgive or fight white oppression. Every step Darren takes in this case is fraught with that tension, and while he's unsure if a child raised by people filled with hate won't already have been poisoned by it, he seems to be the only person involved in the investigation who wants to find the missing nine-year-old.

The characters are rich, the dilemmas of race in America are unflinchingly depicted, and the complex plot is unfolded with evocative language. Once again, Attica Locke redeems the police procedural by raising issues of justice that are too often evaded, in fiction and in reality. Readers will look forward to following her future travels up Highway 59.

Reposted from Reviewing the Evidence. show less

When Levi King, the young son of an Aryan Brotherhood leader, goes missing, Texas Ranger Darren Matthews is sent to the shores of Caddo Lake in East Texas, along the Texas-Louisiana border, not so much to look for the boy, but to look for opportunities to take down more of the Aryan Brotherhood. In fact, it seems except for the boy’s mother and father, who is in prison, no one is terribly concerned about the child. A fellow ranger envisions how prosecuting someone for killing him might shift political winds. Levi’s grandmother seems almost bored and annoyed by the investigation. She has fish to fry.

As a Black man, Darren wonders whether trying to save Levi is just trouble for the future, particularly after discovering Levi has show more harassed the Black man who owns the land Levi’s family is renting. Adding to the mystery are things that go bump in the night, historical ghosts, and contemporary grifters. This is a complex story that serves to illuminate the landmines of white supremacy and law enforcement in the Trump era.

Heaven, My Home is a complex and satisfying mystery full of moral dilemmas and ambiguities. There is some discussion of how Trump’s election will affect the Rangers and their work. There is an increase in hate crimes and violence and the group Darren works with is concerned. Darren also has some hangover worries from the first mystery in this series–but nothing that requires readers to read the first before the second. Darren feels righteous anger with the white voters who chose to burn down the country and expressed that in a couple paragraphs that were brilliant in identifying the racist hypocrisy.

The story is fair, we are given all the information as Darren learns it and are as capable of putting the clues together. I also like there were a few threads not tied into a neat and pretty bow. It’s a great book by an impressive writer.

Heaven, My Home is the second Attica Locke mystery to feature Texas Ranger Darren Matthews. “Bluebird, Bluebird” was an award-winning book that was highly recommended and was on my teetering To-Be-Read pile, AKA Mt. TBR. Heaven, My Home has moved it up closer to the top.

Heaven, My Home will be released on September 17th. I received an e-galley from the publisher through NetGalley.

Heaven, My Home at Serpent’s Tail (UK) and at Hachette Book Group (US)
Attica Locke author site

https://tonstantweaderreviews.wordpress.com/2019/09/10/9780316363310/ show less

I am glad I returned to HIghway 59. Ranger Darren Matthews is back on the job and caught up in a case of a missing child. Racial tensions are high as he navigates the investigation and the complexities in his personal life. For me he continues to be a complicated, yet sympathetic character. I find it frustrating to witness some of his poor decisions. Attica Locke's remarkable descriptions of the East Texas lake is so intense that I got lost in the atmosphere even as I was trying to follow the characters. This is a slow paced mystery, but a rewarding read and I will definitely finish the trilogy.