Rating: 
Summary: Maybe Lansdale's Best Book
Review: I've read all of Joe Lansdale's novels, and a significant percentage of his short stories. I believe that "The Bottoms" may be his best book yet. This novel finds Lansdale exploring new narritive and stylistic territory while staying within many of his traditional themes. This may also be his most accesible book to date, and should gain him some new readers whose sensibilities might be too fragile for some of Joe's earlier horror novels. "The Bottoms" is indeed a horror novel, a genre that Lansdale has not explored for a number of years. Really though, it might be more proper to call this a hybrid of the mystery/crime/detective, horror, and traditional literary forms. There are elements of all of these, but no single aspect is overemphasized.The story is set in 1930's East Texas and centers around a family living in a small town called Marvel Creek. The narration is from the point of view of an old man, near death, telling the story from the point of view of himself as a teenager. The author's narrative execution is truly masterful. Lansdale manages to capture both the point of view of the teenage boy and the elderly man, so that we see everything through both aspects of the same person. The story itself is also constructed with a master's touch. This is a longish novel (more than 400 pages), and the gradual buildup, climax, and denouement are perfectly paced and executed. Many people are primarily familiar with Lansdale through his Hap and Leonard books, but "The Bottoms" is a much different animal. The pacing is much slower, and there is an innocence and wonder that pervades the whole book. As always, though, the best thing about a Joe Lansdale novel is the characters. I feel like I know these characters. It's the characters that will grab you and keep you there for the whole book. "The Bottoms" is some of Lansdale's best writing to date. Don't hesitate.
Rating: 
Summary: Joe is about to get noticed
Review: I have in the past couple of years become familiar with Joe R. Lansdale and have since tried to pick up everything that he has written (an undaunting task). What a prolific writer! However, he has lived in the realm of the obscure and has not received much notice for his excellent writing. That is about to change. Written as a memory of East Texas "The Bottoms" is a wonderful story of a young boy growing up in the midst of racism with a family that refuses to accept the norm. The story takes place during the depression era and involves a serial murderer, as well as the mores of the time. Lansdale has long been a great writer who has paid his dues, and now he will get the recognition he has long deserved. Great work.
Rating:
Summary: The Bottoms is the tops!
Review: This involving mystery starts out as the reflections of an old man looking back on his life and one of the interesting points of his childhood. The novel is set in the 1930's at the bayous of East Texas with creeks, rivers, forests, snakes and all the great components that make for adventure when you are 12 years old. The main character, Harry, finds a murdered black woman bound to a tree using barbed wire. He, along with his sister, Tom, scurry back to report to their father, the local constable, about their find. From there, you are led into a whirlwind of activity in the book that keeps luring you on and on. There are more murders, but there is a depression on and segregation is rampant. Mr. Lansdale does a wonderful job reflecting the thinking of the time and addresses many tough social issues as well. This is a great read and I didn't guess who the murderer was, even at the end!
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Summary: My new Joe R. Lansdale favorite.........
Review: Well I managed to obtain an Advanced Readering Copy of this novel and I just plain shut myself away from everything for a couple days and absorbed this story. I had read some press releases about this being his breakthrough book and well anyone out there that loves mystery stories dealing with the south and during the depression, told through the eyes of a young boy coming of age in a time when life was a struggle but each day brought excitement and adventure as well as constant changes and sadness. I don't need to tell much about this great story except I couldn't put it down and it has touches of many great classic stories about the south and the hatered and prejudices which were a way of live and the struggles of comman families trying to make ends meet. I just loved the boy Harry and his kid sister "Tom" but the cast of characters in this book were especially well thought out. The "Goat Man", Grandma, Harry's Mom and Dad "the barber shop" the river bottoms, the shacks, dead bodies, squirrels, and Toby to mention a few, all add up to one of the most interesting and classic books I've read in many a year. My other personal favorite of Joe's "Mucho Mojo" from his excellent mystery series surrounding Hap and Leonard and their wacky friendship and the troubles they find themselves getting into in East Texas. Still my very favorite author, thanks Joe for this new story and the life you've created in the young boy, Harry and giving us back a time in our countries earlier days that many younger people just never knew about and for your awsome way of telling your stories!
Rating:
Summary: Powerfully endearing
Review: This was the first book I've read by Lansdale and I look forward to reading another. It was an "easy" read - but I loved the simplicity of it - just because it was so down-to-earth and heartwarmingly real. I've heard it compared to To Kill a Mockingbird - and it deserves the comparison. I didn't want it to end - wanting to stay in the towns of Marvel Creek and Pearl Creek - stay in the lives of the engrossing and colorful characters - keep fear at bay with the 1930's residents of these towns dealing with small town murder and a legendary horror figure called the Goat Man. Who cares if certain readers may find the book to be too predictable!!?? The story is a GREAT one - to get lost in and read late into the night (not too late...the Goat Man is out there!!!) You'll love it.
Rating:
Summary: everything you could want and more
Review: Set in depression-era southeast Texas*, this sort-of-mystery, sort-of-maybe-supernatural story reads like a near-gothic frappe of Harper Lee and early M. Night Shyamalan ... with a Texan accent. It's a richly-drawn, finely-told murder mystery related from the primary POV of 2 kids whose father is struggling with the investigation. Technically, I guess, the tale is told by the older sibling, who is now elderly (in a nursing home?); and to tell the truth, I wish Lansdale had left the frame story out of it. There's only so much denoument a novel needs, and I got more wind-down than I really wanted. But even so, it's a damn fine story and Lansdale's writing style is enough to keep you flying from paragraph to paragraph, even during those brief periods when you're less than thrilled with the content. [side note: For those of you who may not be aware, Joe Lansdale is the spectacular fellow who wrote the short story upon which the movie Bubba Ho-Tep was based. If you are blessed enough to own (or rent) a copy of the DVD, be sure to check some of the extras for an interview or two with Lansdale. He seems like quite a character, all lower-bodily fixations aside.]
Rating:
Summary: Great Book
Review: When I finished reading this book, it was like losing an old friend. I thoroughly enjoyed the story and was reluctant to lay it down. I highly recommend this book.
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Summary: A Pretty Potent Brew
Review: Harry Crane discovers the body of a murdered young black woman tangled and hidden in the maze-like scrub of the river bottoms. It's the middle of the Great Depression and the life of a black person isn't worth all that much, but Jacob Crane, Harry's father, is the local law and he wants to solve the crime. However there are forces that hinder and slow his investigation and hateful and hurtful bigots abound. There are racists everywhere.
Harry fixates on the murder and believes himself to be an important part of the investigation and, like his father, he wants to find the killer. And he has a suspect, someone he calls The Goat Man, a mythical, troll-like monster who lives under the swinging bridge that crosses over the Sabine River.
Because of the time and the racial divide and the fact that that divide was often murderously enforced by the Klan, Jacob Crane finds it too risky to continue the investigation. He is forced to let it drop and all he can do is hope that the murderer was one of the many transients of the time.
Harry's life and his world move on and he agonizes about his lost youth and the unsolved crime as he sits in a nursing home with nothing but time on his hands. The Bottoms may be gone now, paved over, but they live in an old man's mind the way a murder did in a young boy's. What a story. A darn good book. One that takes urban legend, gossip and warped family histories, puts them in a caldron, mixes them up with a witch's ladle and slips them into a child's imagination, turning them into a pretty potent brew. Mr. Lansdale is a storyteller extrodinaire, a writer not to be missed.
Rating: 
Summary: Huge Disappointment: The Only Mystery Is Why It Won an Edgar
Review: I will never trust the Edgar Award again after reading this derivative, predictable book. Not only is the murderer obvious from his first introduction, but it is clear who is going to be bumped off next. And although racism is clearly *the* important issue in the South, Lansdale seems rather preoccupied with describing lynching after lynching. One gets the impression that African Americans are nothing but victims in the eyes of this author. And it's positively criminal how much Lansdale lifted from Harper Lee. I'm truly baffled that this book has received so much praise.
Rating: 
Summary: Where have I read this before?
Review: First off, this novel is a good read but (see later)
Basic synopsis: It's a coming-of-age story within the context of a murder mystery. Young Harry Crane and his little sister Tom discover the mutilated body of a black prostitute by the riverside. Their father, one of the important lawmen around, attempts to track down the killer but is continuously stymied by racial tension and misunderstandings. Throughout the novel, Harry grows to understand his father and through him, the concept of manhood. He also begins to appreciate the sharp division between the races and learns from his father that everyone should be treated the same regardless of their skin color. Of course, I'm not going to tell you the ending, but it is pretty good.
Unfortunately, it seems like Lansdale has read To Kill a Mockingbird a bit too many times and is channeling Harper Lee's story throughout the novel. Both this book and Lee's star an older brother and younger sister learning to deal with racial issues. Both look up to a father who is righteous and seeking justice despite the racial divide. Both books also feature a greatly misunderstood social outcast who becomes very important in saving one of the characters.
I did enjoy this book, but I felt that the story was too derivative of To Kill a Mockingbird. Recommended for an interesting mystery but not for originality.
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