The Glass Rainbow (2010) (edit title/settings)

Ridiculously Simplified Synopsis edit see section history

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Summary edit see section history

Characters edit see section history

• Dave Robicheaux: The author’s recurring homicide detective. He once worked for the New Orleans Police Department, but is currently a deputy sheriff in New Iberia, Louisiana. He is a Vietnam War veteran, and suffers from war demons and alcoholism. His first wife was murdered. His current wife, Bootsie, suffers from lupus.
• Cletus Purcel: Dave Robicheaux’s best friend. Helps him out in difficult situations
• Alafair Robicheaux: Dave Robichaux's daughter. She is maturing and becoming willful. Dave has to deal with it.
• Helen Soileau: Add a description of this character.

Quotes edit see section history

• “"The peculiarity of entering one's eighth decade is that questions regarding theology do not sharpen but instead become less significant... We realize that we have been surrounded by connection between the material and the unseen world all our lives."”

  Dave Robicheaux

• “"I have come to learn that memory and presence are inextrically connected and should never be thought of as separate entities."”

  Dave Robicheaux

• “"I thought I could see the past and the present and the future all at once, as though time were not sequiential in nature but took place without a beginning or an end."”

  Dave Robicheaux

• Popular Highlights from Kindle Customers

• If there is any human tragedy, there is only one, and it occurs when we forget who we are and remain silent while a stranger takes up residence inside our skin.

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• Age is an insatiable thief. It steals the pleasures of your youth, then locks you inside your own body with your desires still glowing. Worse, it makes you dependent upon people who are a half century younger than you. Don’t let anyone tell you that it brings you peace, either, because that’s the biggest lie of all.”

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• IT’S THE CONTENTION of Alcoholics Anonymous that drinking is but the symptom of the illness. Those afflicted souls who quit drinking but do nothing else to change their way of life become what are called “dry drunks.” Often they channel their bitterness and anger into the lives of others. They also seek to control everyone around them, and they accomplish this end by the most insidious means possible: the inculcation of guilt and fear and low self-esteem in those who are unfortunate enough to be in their sway.

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• I have come to learn that memory and presence are inextricably connected and should never be thought of as separate entities.

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• IT HAS BEEN my experience that most human stories are circular rather than linear. Regardless of the path we choose, we somehow end up where we commenced—in part, I suspect, because the child who lives in us goes along for the ride.

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• If you’re lucky, at a certain age you finally learn not to contend with the world or try to explain that the application of reason has little or nothing to do with the realities that exist just on the other side of one’s fingertips.

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• THE PECULIARITY OF entering one’s eighth decade is that questions regarding theology do not sharpen but instead become less significant. Better said, need for proof of the supernatural becomes less imperative. At a certain point, perhaps we realize that we have been surrounded by the connections between the material and the unseen world all our lives, but for various reasons, we chose not to see them.

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• mendicant culture they established is still with us, although our problem of conscience regarding their welfare seems to have faded.

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• arpents of farmland that were part of an undivided estate. The arpent is the old French measure that is approximately one acre in size. Its value in that part of rural Louisiana was not great. In fact, Hurricane Rita, which struck the Louisiana coast three and a half weeks after Katrina, devastated the area.

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• sybaritic, the kind you hear in educated southern women who seemed to signal their willingness to stray if the situation is right. “I’m

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Setting & Locations edit see section history

• New Iberia, Louisiana: Small town not far from New Orleans, where Dave Robicheaux is a police detective.
• Lafayette, Louisiana

First Sentence edit see section history

Series & Lists edit see section history

Preceded by Swan Peak, and followed by Creole Belle.

Authors & Contributors edit see section history

1. James Lee Burke (Author)

First Edition edit see section history

Awards edit see section history

• Macavity Awards (2011: Best Mystery Novel)

Classification edit see section history

• Library of Congress: PS3552.U723 G58 2010
• Dewey: 813.54

Notes for Parents edit see section history

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Subjects edit see section history

• Books › Mystery & Thrillers › Authors, A-Z › ( B ) › Burke, James Lee
• Books › Mystery & Thrillers › Thrillers › Suspense
• Books › Mystery & Thrillers › Mystery
• Books › Literature & Fiction › Contemporary

Links to Supplemental Material edit see section history

• Wikipedia Article on Dave Robicheaux: Once an officer for the New Orleans police department, Robicheaux constantly breaches the ethical code over the course of just about every case he works on - seemingly without consequence - and currently pursues cases in New Iberia, Louisiana as sheriff's deputy. He is a recovering alcoholic whose demons stem from his service in the Vietnam War and his impoverished difficult childhood in rural Louisiana; his mother abandoned the family (and was later murdered) and his father died in an oil rig explosion.

Books with Additional Background Information edit see section history