The Dirty South (Charlie Parker #18)

I’ve been a fan and constant reader of John Connolly’s Charlie Parker series for damn near twenty years now. With The Dirty South, the eighteenth entry in this series (nineteenth if you count, and you should, The Reflecting Eye, a Parker novella included in 2004’s story collection, Nocturnes), I can’t help but wonder if I have any superlatives left to throw Connolly’s way, but let’s see what I can muster up here.

The Dirty South takes us back to 1999, inserting itself into the unfolding narrative of Connolly’s debut and readers’ introduction to Charlie Parker in Every Dead Thing. Parker is hunting for the serial killer that brutally murdered his wife and daughter, investigating strings of grisly murders across the US that he hopes will link him to the man that took everything from him. In the course of this investigation, he lands in Arkansas, where two young black women have been murdered in similar fashion and a third has just been discovered. Being the stranger in town, and rather unforthcoming with answers when questioned by police, Parker ends up in a jail cell. It doesn’t take long for the cops to learn about Parker’s history, though, and he goes from suspect to unlikely ally. Originally content to simply leave town, Parker begins to realize that he’s the only one who can speak for these dead women and agrees to help.

By taking us back to very nearly the start of Parker’s on-going and evolving story, The Dirty South might be the most accessible and new reader-friendly entry in ages. I normally advise readers to start from the very beginning with this series because of the way Connolly’s characters and mythology have grown, but for the first time in quite a number of years I actually think somebody who hasn’t yet dived into these books yet could very comfortably wade into this entry and not feel lost.

We see here a younger Charlie Parker, one we haven’t seen in quite some time, one wracked with grief and eager to die so he can rejoin his family, and he hasn’t yet become acquainted with the depth of this honeycomb world or the varied depravity of its inhabitants. The supernatural and horror elements that have become a mainstay of this series over the years are very light here, and act more as a reflection of Parker’s moods, casting them in unreliable shadows and shades of metaphor rather than literal, inexplicable events. Parker’s sarcasm, thankfully, is still on full display, and Connolly against displays his knack for witty banter a number of times over the course of this investigation.

You don’t have to know everything that’s been going on lo these past twenty years to dig into and enjoy The Dirty South, but I think you’ll be keen to discover those stories, too, once you’re finished with this book. And you’ll most definitely want to know more about Luis and Angel!

On a side note, I can’t help but wonder why the hell John Connolly hasn’t won an Edgar or Bram Stoker Award for these books yet. He received a Shamus Award for Every Dead Thing, and deservedly so in my eyes, and an Edgar Award for a short story in 2014, but damnit… he deserves ALL the awards, and I feel like it’s a giant oversight that the Charlie Parker series hasn’t received more recognition from Connolly’s peers in the horror and mystery/thriller communities. He’s a masterful mystery author, and The Dirty South illustrates this perfectly with his cast of ne’er-do-wells, red herrings, and dense but not tryingly complex plotting, as well as a leading character that has proved incredibly enduring (and endearing) over the years. John Connolly is, absolutely, positively, hands-down, one of the best in the business. He’s gotten plenty of well-deserved accolades. Now give him some statues for these novels, damnit!

I can still remember my first Charlie Parker, that battered copy that I found in a secondhand bookstore all those years ago. The adrenaline rush when I realized that I’d found my new addiction. I own ever CP ever written. John Connolly is on a short list of authors I buy the original book and don’t just settle for a digital copy. I don’t do spoiler filled reviews out of respect for the author and the fantastic writing he does. Suffice it yo say, if you want a guaranteed quality read and you haven’t read a Charlie Parker yet, then I highly recommend that you do so, and fast. This one was worth the wait – the book having been delayed by covid. So dear reader, what are you waiting for??

Although nothing can match the impact of the earliest Charlie Parker books, this one is a worthwhile addition. It takes us back in time to the period between the murder of Parker’s wife and daughter, and his unmasking of that murderer. In other words, it falls within the timespan covered by the first book, Every Dead Thing. Parker is following leads concerning other brutal and ritualistic murders of young women and girls, a search that takes him to a small town in Arkansas, where three young black girls have been murdered and their bodies mutilated. While parts of the scenario – including the ruling family with sordid secrets to hide – are familiar, or even routine aspects of many of his books, his writing is superb as always, and he builds characters well. And the outcome certainly surprised me.

I seriously annoyed my wife (again!) with this book; I couldn’t put it down until I finished! Thanks Mr Connolly for a great yarn, albeit written out of sequence, to the world of Charlie Parker…as a fan of the ‘Every Dead Thing’ universe I look forward to future outings

After 18 previous stories “The Dirty South” takes us back to the beginnings of the Charlie Parker saga, in 1990, the period between his resignation from the NYPD and “Every Dead Thing.”
There is very little of the supernatural element we’ve come to expect, except for a couple of brief apparitions of Charlies murdered wife and daughter. There is also a description of a sinister looking pond nearby the small rural Arkansas town where the story is set, but it has no inherent ghostly function. This is a straight forward crime thriller with themes of political and personal corruption foremost. As such, it can be seen with parallels to other nearby states of the readers choice. Connolly’s writing is as supple as ever, with many laugh-out-loud moments, but little of the poetic imagery found in the spookier novels. One thing I found jarring, since I have spent some time in the rural deep South, is a uniformity of voice….uneducated small town people don’t speak the same way as their better-off neighbors, rural small-town cops included. In this book, everyone talks the same. Just a point of detail. As is usually the case in Connolly’s books, things unfold slowly and come to a rapid climax, in this beginning when Louis and Angel arrive.
Perhaps Connolly was looking at the USA’s current state of affairs and felt the need to comment. The UK is going through very similar throes, too. I hope next year’s book gets us back on track. I am waiting to see more about the theme developed in “The black Angel”

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