By J.C. Patterson. Special to the Clarion-Ledger Sunday print edition (July 14)
It’s hard to believe that Ace Atkins’ acclaimed Ranger series has logged book number nine with The Shameless. Summer has officially arrived for a trip to north Mississippi and the heroics of Quinn Colson and his sometime accomplice Lillie Virgil. It’s like watching a John Ford movie with a twist of Faulkner.
Atkins’ fictional Tibbehah County, Mississippi is a magnet for greed, corruption, racism, and dirty deals radiating from the coast to the capitol to the North Mississippi hills.
Retired Army Ranger and reluctant sheriff Quinn Colson is up to his neck in drug and human trafficking, stolen goods and prostitution, run by a criminal Syndicate on the Gulf Coast. At the forefront is truck stop madam Fannie Hathcock, a notorious redhead with very little scruples. Politically speaking, Senator Jimmy Vardaman has his eyes on the governor’s mansion. The Syndicate has Vardaman and his creepy Watchmen bodyguards in their pocket. If Vardaman wins the governor’s race, the Syndicate will rule the state. Add in self-righteous county supervisor Old Man Skinner and his attempt to resurrect a sixty foot cross and you have a typical day in Tibbehah County.
Two young women have recently come to town looking for answers to a twenty year old mystery. In 1997, missing teen Brandon Taylor was found in the Big Woods after a long and arduous search. His death by shotgun was ruled a suicide, but Tashi Coleman and her friend Jessica think otherwise. Summoned to Mississippi by Brandon’s family, the New York duo run a podcast called Thin Air. Throughout the novel, Tashi conducts interviews with local townfolk defaming those involved and implicating those who may not have been, including Sheriff Quinn.
Tashi and Jessica uncover past history on Quinn that has only been hinted in previous novels; his rebellious youth and arrests that former sheriff and Quinn’s uncle Hamp swept under the carpet. Could these discoveries keep Quinn from getting re-elected?
On the Colson family front, Quinn’s sister Caddie is seeing a rich Jackson socialite who’s contributing to her ministry, The River. But are his intentions less than honorable? Quinn’s best friend Boom, seriously injured in last year’s The Sinners, has fallen back on the bottle while trying to heal. And now it’s uncovered that Quinn’s new wife Maggie has ties to the possibly murdered Brandon from twenty years back.
A daring jailhouse break-in silences a prisoner who has ties to the Syndicate. U.S. Marshall Lillie Virgil returns to her old stomping grounds to help Quinn track down the killers. And not a moment too soon. There’s a contract out on Quinn. Vardaman and the Syndicate want the true grit sheriff out of the picture for good.
Atkins takes the reader from political speeches at the Neshoba County Fair to seedy Memphis bars and even a hearty breakfast at The Fillin’ Station in the tiny town of Jericho. The Shameless is rife with corrupt politicians, God-fearing sinners, pole dancers, Native American hitmen, Elvis-lovin’ mamas, snoopy podcasters and a twenty year old mystery that just won’t die.
The last thirty pages of The Shameless will leave you breathless when Quinn answers a call from hell. Not since his service in Afghanistan has The Ranger been up against such bloody odds. Pull out your political fans and buckle up. It’s a fight to the finish between good and Old South evil. The longest of the Quinn Colson series, The Shameless is 446 pages of raunchy redneck misbehavin’. And one of Ace Atkins’ best works by far.
JC Patterson is the author of the “Big Easy Dreamin’” series.
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