The return of a flawed bayou hero

When introduced in the 1987 crime novel “The Neon Rain,” James Lee Burke’s Louisiana lawman Dave Robicheaux was living in New Orleans, a homicide lieutenant suffering from alcoholism, self-loathing and job burnout. By the following year’s sequel, “Heaven’s Prisoners,” he had retreated to his considerably less spoiled Acadian hometown of New Iberia, seeking sobriety and redemption. The move not only added dimension to the character, it also allowed Burke to perfect a seductive writing style mingling mythology, memory tales, poetic ruminations on nature, allusions mystical and Freudian, and enough criminology, melodrama, colorful patter, action, romance and ultra-violence to keep the pages turning and a reader’s blood pumping.

Since that mixture has remained more or less the same for the last 13 novels, it’s not surprising that “Pegasus Descending” blazes no new paths through the bayous. One might think that Hurricanes Katrina and Rita would have prompted some changes in scenery and sentiment, and possibly even plotting, but not here, where the action takes place in the months just before the devastation.

The novel begins with Robicheaux on another memory guilt-trip, this one back to the early 1980s, when he was on assignment to Opa-Locka, Fla., “still going steady with Jim Beam straight-up and a beer back.” Happening upon an afternoon armored car robbery, he’d been too soused to save the life of a security guard, a decorated Vietnam vet whom he had befriended. The painful recollection is triggered by the arrival in New Iberia of the murdered man’s daughter, Trish Klein.

The beautiful grifter is seeking payback from the man she believes killed her father, an ex-bookie named Whitey Bruxal, currently “a major player in Louisiana’s blossoming casino industry.”

Self-made and sinister, polished, physically toned and easily able to ignite Robicheaux’s short fuse, Bruxal would be the typical Burke villain except for one missing element. He’s not homegrown. He may be a poisonous weed in Louisiana’s lush garden, but his roots don’t run deep. Enter Bellerophon Lujan, an alpha Cajun with a mythological first name whose sordid past has morphed into a lifestyle of wealth and privilege complete with an aristocratic, ailing and reclusive wife, a mansion on Bayou Teche and acres of pasture where he raises thoroughbreds and gaited horses, the sort of place to which Pegasus might descend. Lujan and Bruxal are linked by their sons -- who are college roommates and best friends -- and, possibly, by sub rosa criminal activity.

Robicheaux’s official workload includes two investigations -- the suspicious suicide of a local teenage beauty and a just-discovered decomposed corpse presumed to be a hit-and-run victim. That these cases will eventually lead to confrontations with Bruxal and Lujan is a given, but not before a double-gallery of suspects and witnesses is added to the burgeoning cast, along with a quirky female FBI agent, a duplicitous D.A., a smarmy televangelist (who could easily have been excised from the plot) and the regulars -- Dave’s new wife, Molly; his boss, parish Sheriff Helen Soileau; and his old compadre, wild man Clete Purcel, who has a noteworthy mano a mano with Bruxal’s sadistic stooge, Lefty Raguza.

Burke’s novels usually include at least one fallen angel with a broken wing whom Dave feels compelled to help. Here, it’s feckless Monarch Little, an oddly likable gangsta and drug dealer. In a racial dust-up at a local McDonald’s (probably not the company’s idea of good product placement), Monarch is beaten senseless by Slim Bruxal, Whitey’s arrogant offspring. As additional insult to the gangsta’s injury, he becomes an easily sacrificed pawn in a game between the FBI agent, who pressures him to bring charges against his attacker, and Bruxal, who would not balk at murder to keep his son clear of the law.

With its surfeit of villains, minor characters and subplots, “Pegasus Descending” isn’t quite as focused or memorable as the previous book in the series, “Crusader’s Cross.” But Burke gathers his numerous plot threads smoothly and effectively, his flawed hero is as intriguingly complicated as always, and his patented bayou descriptions continue to paint a lovingly evocative portrait of a nature wonderland where evening skies are “the soft pink of a flamingo’s wing.”

That should be more than enough to keep readers happy until Robicheaux’s next crisis of conscience.

Dick Lochte is the author of the suspense thrillers “Sleeping Dog” and “Laughing Dog.”