The Do-Right

If I don’t care about the characters who populate the pages - really care - then I don’t continue reading. Why bother?In The Do-Right, Lisa Sandlin introduces complex, flawed and amazing characters Delpha Wade and Tom Phelan (and a whole cast of others) who grabbed my imagination and wouldn’t let go. Anytime I stopped reading I couldn’t wait to get back to the book!As I neared the end I was grieving that the story was ending; I would miss these people. What happens next in their lives?

The Do-Right spoke to me on many different levels. First off it appeals to my love of noir novels in the vein of Raymond Chandler and Ross MacDonald, of things going not quite right behind the veil of every day life. That it takes place at the end of the Nixon Era was also a bonus. But The Do-Right is also something much larger than that: it is a contemplation on the vary nature of freedom, of love, and the value of forgiveness over hate. Delpha Wade will worm her way into your brain and into your heart. She doesn't let go and you won't mind a bit. Delpha's boss, Tom Phelan, also grabs at you as the kind of guy whom you would not only like to spend a Saturday evening with drinking and shooting the s*** but someone you would trust to help you out of a pinch. He's much more than he seems in all of the right ways. There are also plenty of interesting supporting characters who help weave the story together. As someone else said, this novel would make a great season of True Detective as the plot masterfully winds its way through industrial espionage, revenge, and a good dose of pure, human, evil.What will truly last for me is the time spent in Delpha's head as she learns to navigate her life outside of prison. What freedom feels like for her and how she learns, bit by bit, to move beyond her past. She has much to say, and all of it is worth your time.The ending will surprise you and hopefully, like me, will make you smile.

Sandlin has a nice feel for the personalities and vernacular of folks from down around the Beaumont area. Her characters are engaging and the story line well-plotted. She has a definite feel to her prose, one I found interesting and effective. I'll be looking for more of her work.

A fast moving mystery set in the sticky August of 1973 in Beaumont, Texas, The Do-Right immerses us in a time and place commingled with anxieties and opportunities that come to life in the shape of the main characters. Delpha Wade and Tom Phelan are embarking on new starts against the backdrop of the Nixon Administration's last act. Tom, recently left a finger short by an oil drilling accident, is starting out as a private investigator, while Delpha is coming out of a fourteen year stretch in prison for killing her rapist. Tom hires Delpha as his secretary and the two find swimming legs in the deep waters of small town intrigue by doing well at work they were never trained or qualified to do.Sandlin's pacing is crisp and her language vivid with an ear turned to the penumbra of old Cajun and modern Texan. She hooks together chapters like a tow-rope and pulls the reader through the book we are reluctant to finish and bid adieu to these characters and this place.

I am a Beaumont, TX native and she is spot-on with her local knowledge. But it was really her writing style that 'grabbed me'. I read passages out-loud to my husband and asked, Don't you just love the way she phrased this?

One of the best books I've read in years. A thriller of sorts and a crime novel with a wonderful plot twisting in and out of the characters' linked lives. And also a book about women's strength and power, and the ways that weak men hurt them and strong men can help them. Plus some of the best dialogue you'll ever read and descriptions of southern summer nights to make Faulkner weep.

The author vividly captures the consequences of a long prison stay on an innocent young woman. The heroine is steadfast in using her experience to improve her life. The roustabout turned OJT detective learns fast, delving into seemingly unrelated events that come together at the novel’s end.As business partners in detection, it will be fascinating to watch how their relationship develops in future novels.

The series features an ex oil-rig worker and a recently released female convict. Quirky and lots of local color. I've already bought book two~

This is brooding, slow-burn lit-crime set in Beaumont, Texas in the 1970s, with a great female lead. Great use of language enhances the setting and sense of place.