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Over the past several years Clinton McKinzie has been busily establishing a mythos surrounding his creation, Wyoming State Police Special Agent Antonio Burns. Burns has been portrayed as an over-the-top cop who is barely able to keep in check the demons that run rampant over his older brother, Roberto. The most recent novel in the series, the appropriately named CROSSING THE LINE, concluded with Roberto being maimed for life by a dangerous drug lord and with Antonio excising a brutal but appropriate revenge. While the series always has been strong, it is BADWATER --- McKinzie's latest novel --- that fulfills the promise of his previous efforts and that propels him, and Antonio Burns, to must-read status.
BADWATER finds Antonio Burns sidelined to hunting methamphetamine labs and reporting their presence to his state headquarters, where his reports will be acted upon or, more often than not, consigned to waste in a backwash of budget cuts and mismatched priorities. It is while hunting one of these labs that Burns stumbles upon the aftermath of a scene that will ultimately bring the repercussions for his past actions to a head and that will directly and indirectly affect the direction of his life.
The scene involves the drowning of a ten-year-old Badwater, Wyoming boy who dies in spite of Burns's best and most valiant efforts. The townspeople want Jonah Strasburg, the tourist who precipitated the drowning, charged with murder, even though there are serious questions as to whether or not the man was defending himself against an attack from the dead boy and his cousins. Burns, unwillingly involved as part of the prosecution's team, finds that the proceedings have little to do with justice. Luke Endow, the prosecutor, is a former special agent and is Burns's former partner. Up for re-election in a hotly contested race, Endow plans on bringing the force of his office to bear against Strasburg, who is primarily guilty of being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
Matters are further complicated when William J. Bogey becomes involved in Strasburg's defense. Bogey, a celebrity lawyer whose star has begun to fade, sees his defense of Strasburg as just the ticket to resuscitate his fading career. Endow and Bogey, as it turns out, have an embittered history and neither is willing to give an inch. Burns is determined to see that Strasburg receives a fair trial and that he lives long enough to receive it. Burns finds that he must enlist the aid not only of his brother Roberto but also an unlikely ally on the defense team. When Burns is the subject of an apparently heartless betrayal, he finds that he ultimately must rely only upon himself to see that mercy, and justice, are applied in equal and appropriate measure --- even if it means that he must function outside of the law he has sworn to uphold.
McKinzie's narrative thread is straightforward and uncluttered by complexity, while maintaining an unpredictable storyline during which literally anything can happen, and usually does. Burns's life takes another twist or two here, leaving one to wonder whether the conclusion of BADWATER is an end, a new beginning, or a little of both. What is really important here, however, is McKinzie's first-rate storytelling, which enables even readers encountering Burns for the first time to feel familiar and comfortable with a storyline that gradually has been unfolding over the course of several novels. And while Burns's --- and McKenzie's --- predilection with rock climbing might be off-putting to those not similarly addicted, in this novel it serves as more of an allegory than as a backdrop to the main story.
You'll want to put BADWATER at the top of your summer reading list.
--- Reviewed by Joe Hartlaub
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