Lightning Men

A Novel

By: Thomas Mullen

Narrated by: Yahya Abdul-Mateen II

From the acclaimed author of “the most compelling new series in crime fiction” (Michael Koryta, New York Times bestselling author) comes “a sharply observed novel” (New York Times) that explores race, law enforcement, and justice in mid-century Atlanta.

Officer Denny Rakestraw and “Negro Officers” Lucius Boggs and Tommy Smith have their hands full in an overcrowded and rapidly changing Atlanta. It’s 1950 and racial tensions are simmering as black families, including Smith’s sister, begin moving into formerly all-white neighborhoods. When Rake’s brother-in-law launches a scheme to rally the Ku Klux Klan to “save” their neighborhood, his efforts spiral out of control, forcing Rake to choose between loyalty to family or the law.

Across town, Boggs and Smith try to shut down the supply of white lightning and drugs into their territory, finding themselves up against more powerful foes than they’d expected. Battling corrupt cops and ex-cons, Nazi brown shirts and rogue Klansmen, the officers are drawn closer to the fires that threaten to consume the city once again.

With echoes of Walter Mosley and Dennis Lehane, Mullen “expands the boundaries of crime fiction, weaving in eye-opening details from our checkered history” (Chicago Tribune).

Involved and entertaining!

Another quality entry in the series. Really like this series and the way Mullen delves into the social complexities of the time and how it affects the protagonist s both black and white. Mullen is adept at explaining Jim Crow practices in a succinct but clear way without the story lulling. Waiting patiently for the next entry!

Distopia

We have all read distoia novels like 1984, Brave New World, Anthem, and Handmaid's Tale. Those were imagined distopias meant to warn us. Darktown. however, is a real world distopia that we Americans created and tolerated for a century. We all shared some of the founders' scizophrenia as they put lofty visions of individual liberty on paper while practicing something very different in their private affairs. Let us continue to undo that distopia and its dying echos on paper and in our personal conduct.

The devil is in the details.

Thomas Mullens fleshes out the complex interplay of the 1940’s at the beginning of the disintegration of Jim Crow in Atlanta, and the hiring of the first black police officers, and what their lives were like The details of the betrayals, hatreds, corruption, and violence mixed in with the act of policing, and how it affects the community is riveting. Underneath each interaction, there is the need of white society and officers to degrade the existence of the blacks, and as history will bear out, the impossibility of keeping them permanently in their places.

Wonderful listen!

I listened to “Darktown“ and loved it. “ I enjoyed “Lightning Men” even more. Highly believable characters that aren’t drawn too simplistically. Like Darktown, the book is set in racist Jim Crow Atlanta in the 1950s, and focuses particularly on the struggles of two black police officers, and secondarily on the struggles of a white officer trying to be less racist than the other whites around him. While the story focuses on black versus white community/housing and policing conflicts, nothing about this book is simplistically black and white. Humanity shines through in this book and its characters. All of the characters are drawn with highly realistic shades of gray. The narrator is good but would do well to learn how to vary his voice more and noticeably mimic black vs white dialects, when appropriate. Overall an extremely rewarding listen. Highly recommended!

A Little Too Much

Thomas Mullen certainly gives his readers the service they want with Lightning Men. Building off the previous novel, Darktown, Mullen goes deeper into the plight of Boggs and Smith and their careers as Atlanta’s first African-American police officers. He builds on the story of Officer Denny Rakestraw, a white officer who is not totally opposed to the idea of black officers, but finds himself living in a transition town – white suburbia now threatened to become another Darktown. Mullen’s plot twists and turns with real estate deals, moonshine and marijuana, and tensions between the always-incompetent KKK and their threatening successors, the Colombians. All and this more is breached cover-to-cover in one of the very few times that the old adage once made famous by Sir Mick about too much never being enough is unfortunately not true as Lightning Men suffers from that dreaded curse of sequelitis.

You know, that stigmata is not entirely fair. Lightning Men is a compelling, well-written, and highly entertaining read. Mullen fleshes out 1950s Atlanta and presents the attitude of the city and the blatant bigotry throughout. Mullen digs deeper with his plot, tying various, complicated threads to key characters and letting the reader watch it all unfold. Yet, some of this plot is too obtuse. The map presented sprawls and rambles as long and as wide as Peachtree Street. Maybe Mullen binge watches Game of Thrones and as such, gives too much importance to the B-, C-, and D-story arcs, thus taking away the importance – and the very relevance – of the A-story. Crime novel readers don’t want a ramble down a shady lane in the sun. They want a punch to the gut. Hard punches. With a blow to the nose and a killer uppercut to knock you out. Lightning Men doesn’t have enough punches, but plenty of weaving and feints.

Lightning Men is a worthy follow-up and is successful in structuring, then embellishing, the characters’ arcs. However, too many new characters are introduced and with that comes a level of convenience in working the plot around these new characters and as a result, the story suffers.

Just a little. And just too much.

But not enough to keep me away from my next visit to Darktown.