New York Times bestseller James Lee Burke returns with his
latest masterpiece, the story of a father and son separated by war and
circumstance—and whose encounter with the legendary Holy Grail will
change their lives forever.
From its opening scene in
revolutionary Mexico to the Battle of the Marne in 1918, and on to the
bordellos and saloons of San Antonio during the reign of the Hole in the
Wall Gang, House of the Rising Sun is an epic tale of love,
loss, betrayal, vengeance, and retribution that follows Texas Ranger
Hackberry Holland on his journey to reunite with his estranged son,
Ishmael, a captain in the United States Army.
After a violent
encounter that leaves four Mexican soldiers dead, Hackberry escapes the
country in possession of a stolen artifact, earning the ire of a
bloodthirsty Austrian arms dealer who then places Hack’s son Ishmael
squarely in the cross hairs of a plot to recapture his prize, believed
to be the mythic cup of Christ.
Along the way, we meet three
extraordinary women: Ruby Dansen, the Danish immigrant who is Ishmael’s
mother and Hackberry’s one true love; Beatrice DeMolay, a brothel madam
descended from the crusader knight who brought the shroud of Turin back
from the Holy Land; and Maggie Bassett, one-time lover of the Sundance
Kid, whose wiles rival those of Lady Macbeth. In her own way, each woman
will aid Hackberry in his quest to reconcile with Ishmael, to vanquish
their enemies, and to return the Grail to its rightful place.
House of the Rising Sun
is James Lee Burke’s finest novel to date, and a thrilling entry into
the Holland family saga that continued most recently with Wayfaring Stranger, which The New York Times Book Review described as “saturated with the romance of the past while mournfully attuned to the unholy menace of the present.”