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Book Summary and Reviews of The Rules of Wolfe by James Carlos Blake

The Rules of Wolfe by James Carlos Blake

The Rules of Wolfe

A Border Noir

by James Carlos Blake

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  • Published:
  • Jul 2013, 240 pages
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About this book

Book Summary

Eddie Gato Wolfe is a young, impetuous member of the Wolfe family of Texas gun-runners that goes back generations. Increasingly unfulfilled by his minor role in family operations and eager to set out on his own, Eddie crosses the border to work security for a major Mexican drug cartel led by the ruthless La Navaja.

Eddie falls for a mysterious woman named Miranda, whom he learns too late is the property of an intimate member of La Navaja's organization. When they're discovered, the violent upshot forces Eddie and Miranda to run for their lives, fleeing into the deadly Sonora Desert in hope of crossing the border to safety.

But La Navaja's reach is far and his lust for revenge insatiable. He sends a horde of operatives and the notorious bounty hunter El Martillo after the pair. If La Navaja's men don't kill Eddie and Miranda, the brutal desert just may. Their only hope: help from the family that Eddie abandoned.

At once a riveting thriller and an inside look at the blood-drenched Mexican drug trade, The Rules of Wolfe is another classic crime novel from a writer Entertainment Weekly calls, "one of the greatest chroniclers of the mythical American outlaw life."

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Reviews

Media Reviews

"Starred Review. While the basic setup is familiar, Blake's masterful action-driven narrative and his revealing look at the ultraviolent Mexican drug trade rival the best of Don Winslow and Kem Nunn." - Publishers Weekly

"Starred Review. Blake's prose is muscular, his dialogue and details are keenly observed, and his jump-cuts to minor characters' fates are entertainingly cinematic. His characters are lively, and so is his plot - the nearer Eddie gets to escaping, the agonizingly farther away he seems. Will he make it? Either way, it's one hell of a ride." - Booklist

"Blake's customary zest for life and death makes his latest modern historical thriller violent, sexy and exciting." - Kirkus

This information about The Rules of Wolfe was first featured in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.

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Author Information

James Carlos Blake

James Carlos Blake is the author of eleven novels. Among his literary honors are the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, Southwest Book Award, Quarterly West Novella Prize, and Chautauqua South Book Award. He is a member of the Texas Institute of Letters and lives in Arizona.

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