Rating: 
Summary: Provocative Realism
Review: When I read that Joe Lansdale was an excellent writer that few knew about, I wanted to see for myself. Every positive comment about his writing is true. He has the ability to transport you to a different time and place and gives you a vivid picture of what living there is like.In THE BOTTOMS, he takes you to East Texas in the 1930's amidst the racism, ignorance, poverty and violence as well as the friendships and family ties during a less complex and simpler time. In essence, THE BOTTOMS is the nostalgic, forlorn memoirs of a fictional Southerner on his deathbed. Harry Crane narrates the story of finding the mutilated, ravaged body of a Black woman and the subsequent community reaction and search for the killer by the part-time constable Jacob Crane, Harry's father. The power of the novel is found in the characterizations and dialogue. It is so well written it feels like you're right there with Harry as he eavesdrops on secret conversations. You can feel the tension and the anger and disgust developing within you toward some of the characters as they reveal their racial prejudice and hatred. Race relations are written as they really happenned and it helps you realize what it must have been like to live then. It illustrates a shameful past and adds depth and realism to the history lessons we all learned in school. It feels like you are there and makes you want to crawl into the pages and confront the evil first hand. Any writer that has that ability should be read. Joe R. Lansdale has that ability. THE BOTTOMS is highly recommended.
Rating: 
Summary: Gripping and Vibrant
Review: This is the second Lansdale novel I've read, after the uproarious "Drive-In" which I highly recommend. Comparisons to Harper Lee notwithstanding, The Bottoms is a gripping, vibrant story of one child's journey from the world of innocence to experience through a gauntlet of racism and murder. By turns chilling, uplifting, horrifying and, finally, bittersweet, Mr. Lansdale has fashioned an excellent and moving novel. The language is colorful and assured; the setting evocative and rich. But best of all are the characters, especially Miss Maggie and Mose, who will stay with you long after you've closed this book for the last time.
Rating:
Summary: A Story Well Worth Reading, Again and Again
Review: Set in the thirties, during the depression, young Harry Crane discovers the mutilated body of a black woman bound to a tree with barbed wire in the maze-like scrub of the river bottoms. His father, the local constable and part time barber, sets out to solve the murder and he doesn't get much cooperation because whites fear a renegade Negro and blacks fear a vengeful reprisal. Harry's imagination runs wild. He can't think of anything but the murder and he too wants to find the killer. His prime suspect is the Goat Man, the myth-monster who lives like a troll under the rotting swinging bridge that crosses the Sabine River. After a white woman is killed, the local Klansmen lynch an elderly black man, but of course he wasn't the killer. Maybe it was the Goat Man after all, maybe not. Maybe it was a "travelin' man,' a term that would later be changed to "serial killer." And maybe the killer is a lot closer than anybody thinks. The story combines twisted family histories, gossip, myth, urban legend, a child's imagination, considerable gore, a generous number of decaying corpses, some raw sexuality and characters that you'll never forget. It's a story about a lot of things, good and evil, death, justice and the law, to name a few. It's a story well worth reading, again and again. Sophie Cacique Gaul
Rating:
Summary: The Bottoms is an intimate trip...get onboard
Review: I have been struggling with this review. I think that is because "The Bottoms" was such a personal experience that trying to find the words to share my thoughts with others is a bit difficult. However, I believe this deserves telling because "The Bottoms" is a very special book and I wish to share the experience with others. This is the tale of Harry, a boy grappling with bridging that difficult gap between childhood and manhood. Along the way he confronts the search for a serial killer, race relations and his love for his parents with all their faults that we are loathe to accept in our parents. The story takes place in Eastern Texas during the Depression. Although this is not a time and place I am familiar with, I found myself meandering through the woods, creeks and rural roads without feeling like a stranger to this part of the country. Mr. Lansdale made it so real to me that I could feel the heat, smell the air and want to swat at flies or scratch imaginary mosquito bites. It was as if I were hiding in the woods, in the barn or behind a chair in the farmhouse watching the story enfold before my eyes. Mr Lansdale has a wonderful talent for bringing you into the pictures he creates. His ability to do this reminds me of Stephen Booth's writing in "The Black Dog." Although I figured out who the murderer was early in the book, that didn't detract one iota from my pleasure in reading this book. I was so caught up in lives of a family that I had come to love that catching a serial killer became superfluous to their story. Of all the characters in the book, I was most drawn to Jacob, Harry's father. Aside from the fact that I wished I had grown up with a father like Harry, I suffered with him during his crisis of faith in his core moral beliefs and the very purpose for his existence. This book will hold you in its grip until the very last page. The last chapter lulled me into a sense of complacency only to find myself in tears when reading the last few paragraphs. I would urge you to read "The Bottoms" and experience your own personal trip.
Rating:
Summary: ENGAGING TALE OF GROWING UP
Review: Mr. Lansdale proves what a versatile writer he in in "The Borders," the book for which he won the Edgar Award for Best Novel. Although the book has the elements of a mystery. Lansdale takes his reader more into the territory of "A Boys Life," "Stand by Me" and even "To Kill a Mockingbird." Without rehashing the plot again, Lansadle gives us a wonderfully written narrator's voice (the 80 and 11 year old Harry Collins) who tells his tale with both sadness and whimsical fondness. The relationships with his father, Jacob; his mother May; his sister Tom; his grandmother; the elderly Miss Maggie, and all interweave into a complex plot. There is a point in the novel where the identity of the murderer becomes obvious, but it's so deftly interwoven, you forget until it is identified. The book shows the sad side of segregation in the thirties where being "colored" was being "nothing." Lansdale gives a very good inclination of that life, and includes some remarkably likeable "coloreds."
A very well written book.
Rating:
Summary: A deeper, darker Lansdale.
Review: Last year a friend of mine told me about Joe R. Lansdale and the Hap Collins-Leonard Pine mysteries. Being from Crockett, Texas, near Nacogdoches, he knew I could identify with the stories and characters. They were great, but until "The Bottoms" they were my only experience with JRL.
The era of the story was a little before my time, but the people and the setting really hit home. It is deep East Texas at it's best and worst. I read it in one long sitting and wanted to start reading it again. I can't get enough of his books set in East Texas, and people in other parts of the country should know the settings and the people are right on the money.
Rating:
Summary: Too Much Like "To Kill a Mockingbird"
Review: This is a well written, coming of age, murder mystery. No doubts about that. But it seems as if Mr. Lansdale stole many of the primary elements from Harper Lee's "To Kill a Mockingbird". As a result, I was greatly disappointed at the end, after the story had taken off on such a new and fascinating tack. If you've never read "...Mockingbird", then "The Bottoms" is a great read!
Rating:
Summary: A pleasing mixture of several genres
Review: In The Bottoms, author Joe Lansdale has superimposed a murder mystery over a coming of age story. To this he adds the setting of the rural south during the Great Depression which he couples with the racial tensions of that place and time. The result of this eccletic mixture is an engaging page-turner with wide appeal. Landsdale tells his story from the perspective of 11-year Harry, although it is an elderly Harry looking back on his childhood who narrates the tale. A chance discovery of Harry and his younger sister, Tom, launches a search for a serial killer by their father, Jacob, the town's constable. Memorable characters along the way include Harry's eccentric grandmother, a black doctor ahead of his time, a bigoted old man and his hateful sons, a neighboring constable with connections to both of Harry's parents, a reclusive elderly black man, and finally, a mysterious figure known only as the "Goat Man." Although the plot does have parallels to To Kill a Mockingbird, its blend of elements makes it uniquely worthwhile. And even if you solve the mystery ahead of time like I did, this book is sure to captivate you to the very last page.
Rating:
Summary: A Superb Coming-Of-Age Story And A Chilling Murder Mystery!
Review: Set in East Texas during the Great Depression, Joe Lansdale's "The Bottoms" is a wonderful coming-of-age tale about life in a simpler time. "The Bottoms" also tells the story of the heinous serial killer who stalked the bottoms, the low lying lands around the Sabine River, and how the mystery of the killer's identity was solved. Twelve year-old Harry Collins narrates and recalls, very visually, a time when concrete had not taken over most of the land he so loved. He and his nine year-old sister Tom, (for Thomasina), knew the woods and the river where they fished, hunted and roamed, as their second home. The two of them, out late one evening hunting squirrels, came across the naked, mutilated body of a black woman. They believed the killer was the dreaded Goat Man, of local legend, who supposedly lived and lurked beneath the old swinging bridge that crossed the Sabine River. The discovery of the body brought racial prejudice and hatred to the fore, and violence threatened to overtake the civilized veneer of the town's white population. Jacob Crane, town constable, was the childrens' father and the only white man concerned with the killing. Popular opinion had it that if a black woman was murdered then a black man must have killed her, and that was not the business of white folk, not even the constable. Harry again witnessed the appearence of the horned Goat Man. The number of murder victims slowly rose, each corpse more gruesome than the last. And the town's racial tensions increased along with the number of murder victims. The hysteria grew when it was discovered that the latest woman to die was part white. Secrets long kept silent were revealed. And Harry began to learn things a twelve year-old should never have to know. Jacob Crane still could not find the killer. The creature, known as the Goat Man continued to walk the river landscape while an unknown killer menaced the town's residents. Joe Landsale has written a riveting mystery and a wonderful novel of southwestern rural life in the early 1930s. His prose is lyrical and the voice and character of young Harry is amazingly vivid and realistic. Harry is wonderful, likable young man. His interactions with his Dad and subsequent personal growth are alone worth the read. All Landsale's characters are compelling, the two children, their parents and grandmother - who is an absolute 'original,' Maggie, an ancient black woman and family friend, Mose, all the townspeople, the family dog - even the killer. Descriptions of the landscape, mouthwatering food, people, feelings, the weather, are all written with great mastery and an eye for detail. I really couldn't put the book down. This Edgar Award winning novel is one of the best mysteries I have read in a long time...
Rating:
Summary: Good Book! But thank Harper Lee too...
Review: This was the first I have read of Joe Lansdale's books and I'd now like to read others. The plot moves very quickly (I read it in 2 nights), the characters are believable, the setting is vividly described, the dialogue some of the more realistic I have seen in books about the South. Lansdale does not gloss over any of the more disturbing aspects of race relations. At times I thought 'The Bottoms' borrowed a little too heavily from 'To Kill A Mockingbird.' If you want to see Atticus Finch fall off the wagon and lose his temper or Boo Radley in his creepiest role yet, you should check this one out. Highly recommended...I'll definitely read more by this writer.
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