Product Description

In the second installment of the Hap Collins-Leonard Pine series, Leonard is still recuperating from the injuries he suffered in the first book (Savage Season) when he learns that his Uncle Chester has died. Hap agrees to stay with Leonard and help clean out the rundown house that he's inherited; when they find a small skeleton buried under the floor, it's up to them to prove that Chester wasn't responsible for a string of child murders by finding the real killer.

Lansdale slowly develops the relationship between his two protagonists as they banter with each other throughout their pursuit of the killers. Mucho Mojo also introduces two other characters, LaBorde Police Department members Lieutenant Marvin Hanson and his sidekick, Charlie, who serve as ongoing sources of friction--and, when it's most needed, support.

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Product Details

Publisher	Vintage
ISBN	0307455394
Features	ISBN13: 9780307455390 Condition: New Notes: BUY WITH CONFIDENCE, Over one million books sold! 98% Positive feedback. Compare our books, prices and service to the competition. 100% Satisfaction Guaranteed
Format	Paperback
Author	Joe R. Lansdale
EAN	9780307455390
Label	Vintage
Edition	Reprint
Dewey Decimal Number	813.54
Studio	Vintage
Number Of Pages	320
Title	Mucho Mojo: A Hap and Leonard Novel (2) (Vintage Crime/Black Lizard)
Release Date	2009-01-06
Publication Date	2009-01-06
Manufacturer	Vintage

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Customer Reviews

"Macho does not provide mucho." Zsa Zsa Gabor

Review by michael a. draper, 2010-08-24

"Mucho Mojo" would be a good book to take on vacation. The story moves along nicely and has an interesting plot.

Leonard Pine is surprised to learn that he has inherited his Uncle Chester's home and $100.000. Leonard's feeling was that his uncle didn't approve of him because Leonard is gay.

His friend, Hap Collins is with him when he arrives at his uncle's home and finds drug dealers using his uncle's porch to conduct their drug business.

Leonard asks Collins to move in with him and help him fix the house up. They are busy doing this when they find the body of a young child in the basement. There are also photos of little children in sex positions and some coupons. At first they think that Leonard's uncle may have been the killer and a child pornographer but on reviewing the evidence Leonard remembers that his uncle was a cop wanna be and that he was probably looking for the killer and perhaps leaving a message before the senility that was effecting him, took hold of his brain.

The author is dealing with some sensitive subjects in this novel. Pine is a black man who is gay. Collins is a white man who is straight. Their relationship and acceptance of each other is well described. We also read of the problem of drugs in the inner city and what crack does to a neighborhood and the children who live there. Finally, we read of child pornography and pedophilia.

The story is entertaining and the characters are likable. Lansdale has a talent with his character's dialogue that makes the reader feel as if they are being told the story in the character's own voice.

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James Lee Burke Without the Attitude

Review by Gary Griffiths, 2009-05-05

Following their 1990 debut in "Savage Season", Joe Lansdale's lovable butt-kicking east-Texan's Hap Collins and Leonard Pine are back for another melee in "Mucho Mojo", a ripping tale of lurid crime, racial tension, and raunchy sex told in that down-home, easy banter of the south that Joe Lansdale does so well. Leonard's uncle Chester has died, and while estranged, he played an important role model in Leonard's youth. So when asked to travel back to LaBorde, Texas, for the funeral and help in settling Chester's affairs, Hap can't hardly refuse to abandon his near-slave labor in the rose fields and oblige. But while cleaning up uncle Chester's wreck of a house, the boys uncover a small skeleton locked in a trunk beneath the floor boards, casting a despicable pall of pedophilia and murder over the good uncle's memory and reputation.

Despite what seems to be overwhelming evidence, Leonard can't believe his judgment of character could be so far off, and with the intermittent and reluctant help of the local PD, Hap and Leonard see if they can unwind a story that clear uncle Chet - or at least confirm his guilt. Along the way, Leonard falls hard in a torrid love affair with a young black attorney, while both boys match wits (some) and trade punches (mostly) with the local drug gang holed up in the crack house next door.

With Lansdale, especially when Hap and Leonard are featured, you can count on enough action and martial violence to have Lee Child's Jack Reacher straining to keep up. Think of James Lee Burke's Dave Robicheau with a sense of humor and half the baggage - that's Hap Collins. But unlike Child's precise, sterile and no-nonsense prose, Lansdale's brutality is softened with his southern wisdom - an enlightened but believable no less charming good old boy who mixes enough morality and intelligence in his mayhem to make this more than a simple mystery. Never one to shy away from controversy, Lansdale wades into the weighty topics of child pornography and drug abuse with more standard murder and corruption, while taking a glancing shot at religion, with the politics of race and homosexuality as much a part of Lansdale's stories as east Texas' humidity.

So maybe the wily Lansdale shows his cards a bit too early before a satisfying if predictable climax, Hap's love interests do little for a story that stands strong without them, and perhaps the breakneck pace slows for a nap or two along the way. But if you like smart dialog laced in dark humor, fast action with a decidedly bloody edge, and smart characters wrapped up in writing that you know Lansdale had to bust his tail to make it look this easy - this is crime fiction not to be missed - a series and an author well deserving their "American classic" accolades.

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Hap and Leonard

Review by Amos Lassen, 2009-03-12

Lansdale, Joe R. "Mucho Mojo", Vintage Reprint. 2009.

Hap and Leonard

Amos Lassen


"Mucho Mojo" is the second re-released book in Joe Lansdale's Hap Collins/Leonard Pine series. In "Savage Season", Leonard was injured when he learned that his Uncle Chester died and now he is still recuperating. He has inherited a small house and Hap goes with him to help clean it out. While there they find a small skeleton under the floor and now they must prove that Uncle Chester was not the one responsible for several child murders. To do so they must find the person who is guilty.
In this book the relationship between the two men is further developed. We see this through the lively dialog between the two as they go after the murderer/s. We also meet new characters--Marvin and Charlie, members of the LaBorde police force.
When Leonard's Uncle Chester discovered that his nephew was gay, he disinherited him but after his death, Leonard still received the house. As Leonard and Hap begin to fix up the place, they find not only the skeleton but a stash of child porn magazines. This gives them a sense of responsibility to find out who did this terrible thing and as they investigate, they deal with social problems such as child molestation, exploitation, drug use and violence. Through the two guys we meet a wonderful grandmother figure, MeMaw, a corrupt minister and drug dealers and we get a bizarre story.
Hap and Leonard are two politically incorrect characters and the book is loaded with stereotypes and stigmas and you can't help but laugh at them. The two are philosophical and odd but they are true friends and Lansdale draws them well. Through Hal and Leonard's interaction with the other characters, we get quite a commentary on race, sex and justice.
Lansdale writes with biting sarcasm and wit and his ideas are tough. This is a good story with suspense and a view on life. Reading "Mucho Mojo" can cause you become a fan of Joe Lansdale--I know it made me one.

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Excellent

Review by R. Bullock, 2007-07-27

Lansdale has perhaps created one of the most interesting couplings in Hap Collins and Leonard Pine - a Democrat white heterosexual and a Republican black homosexual, respectively. Their interactions alone are nearly interesting enough, when you add the actual plotline to the mix, you have a no-fail concoction.

Hap and Leonard are dealing with the aftermath of "Savage Season," the first book in the Hap and Leonard series, when Leonard's Uncle Chester dies, leaving him his run-down house and some mysterious, seemingly random items. To boot, Uncle Chester's got a "bottle tree" in his backyard to ward off the eponymous "mucho mojo" (meaning "much bad magic"). This charming abode has a few unpleasant aspects - it's a few dorrs down from a functioning crackhouse and it has the skeletal remains of a young boy in a box under the floorboards. It's up to Hap and Leonard to decipher the unusuals clues Uncle Chester left, and figure out just who is committing such heinous crimes.

There are some wonderful characters in this novel - some will strike you as not-good-people almost from the get-go, and some will take you by real surprise. Lansdale is magic with his dialogue, and Hap and Leonard have some of the Best Conversations Ever. I cannot recommend this enough.

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A different kind of hard-boiled

Review by JGM, 2006-06-08

Lansdale writes tough, and this book has some of the most effective and sinewy descriptions of close-in, bareknuckle conflict you'll find. The unlikely pair of protaganists are much more than action heroes, though: they manage to be quirky, philosophical, and prone to late-night conversations that ring of true friendship. The secondary characters are well-drawn as well, particularly the elderly neighbor and a pair of policemen who provide something of a mirror-image to the main duo. The nature of the characters and their relationships yield blunt yet astute commentary on matters of race, sex, and justice.

The only real weakness here is the central mystery, which is a bit telegraphed and overwrought. One gets the feeling that Lansdale might have done better with a straight storyline, which these characters could easily carry.

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