Safe House (Burke Series #10) Book

This is Burke #10. He is not known for long explanations or discourses or character development. Here is one example of the kind of rough sketch that you have to expect from Vachss.
Vyra doesn't know what I do , but she knows I'm not an accountant. She get nosy every once in a while - just to keep in practice, I think. But she doesn't push, and it never comes to anything.
Vyra knows where to find me. Or where to leave word, anyway. She never calls unless she's already got a hotel room. And if I'm around when she calls, we get together and do what we do.
But only if I'm around when she calls. I never think about what she does when I'm not.
You learn a bit about the six or so supporting actors (including the dog) who appear regularly in the series. But pretty much limited to one or two things. Once you have reached this book (#10) in the series you know what pinch of plot each one adds. It is pretty immutable from book to book. They are all odd balls and the single skill that each one has only works only to advance the plot and not to deepen our feeling for the character. About a decade has gone by since the first book and there are some changes in the characters due to the passing of the years: the boy becomes a teenager, the transvestite becomes a woman with her sex change operation. In a relative sense these might seem to be examples of major but they are anticipated, no surprises.
With Vachss you get some interesting stray information in the mix. What's the scoop in a good cigar?
"An old pal of mine makes them down in Honduras. Cuban seeds, Cuban artisans, but he says Cuban soil is all played out. These are better."
You get unique NYC atmosphere. Since I love NYC and have some familiarity with it, that is always enjoyable.
The place looked like a Southern juke joint, only bigger and without the music. Ramshackle, thrown-together furniture, a big red-and-white Coke sign behind the wood plank bar, yellowing posters on the walls - looked like they'd been swiped from a Medicaid dentist's office. The low ceiling trapped a heavy, multi-tone hum of voices, keeping the heat close to the floor. Somebody had nailed a THANK YOU FOR NOT SMOKING sign to the side wall. The floor was a giant ashtray.
Of course there is the familiar.
A tureen of hot-and-sour soup was at my elbow even before she made her way to my booth in the back.
Always the familiar. And always direct and without embellishment.
Once, I'd asked her why I had to have at least three bowls at every sitting. "Bowl small," is all she said, and I haven't questioned her since.
Something new: a bad guy who wants a new career as a gardener. Really. Right at the beginning on page thirty-seven. No real relevance to the plot except that it allows the potential gardener to observe that one woman has eyes that are "brown like peat moss."

Humor: a lawyer joke. Understated. The Burke Way.
"Yes. Of course, I'm sure you've heard this a thousand times in your line of work."
Seeing as how she'd been nice enough to upgrade me from thug to psychologist - or downgrade me to lawyer, I couldn't tell which - I decided to let that one pass.
You got to be prepared for unusual names in a Burke story. You've already run into Vyra up at the top of this review. But what do you think about Crystal Beth? Is that too cute? Burke usually has a new woman in each book. Crystal Beth is the new woman in this book. I say to myself, "Am I really reading this?" Vachss books are not meant to seriously challenge your brain. But it is interesting to wonder if a strong woman - maybe even a feminist - could also be a willing sex object.

You have seen Burke's recommendation of singer Judy Henske in prior books as well as this one. He has an author to add to his recommendation list here: Joe R. Lansdale. Just remember that this book was published in 1998 so you have to look for his books from that era. Look for the Hap Collins and Leonard Pine series that began in 1990. "Hap and Leonard return in this incredible, mad-dash thriller, loaded with crack addicts, a serial killer, and a body count." Number eleven in that series Dead Aim was just published in January 2013.

I got interested in Vachss because he struggled with and wrote about child abuse. Safe House is mostly about stalkers. Our hero (hero is strange word to attach to Burke) was a seriously abused child and he mentions that in each book as he gives some of his personal background. So, with that connection, all of the Burke books are connected with child abuse. But I wanted more on abused children and the people who abuse them. It seems so strange that Burke is opposed to and is a victim of violence on the one hand and yet is such a consistent user of violence on the other hand.

There are about a half dozen one page examples of different stalking MOs towards the end of the book. They are interesting and help you learn more about the topic, but, as I have observed several times, it is information that doesn't add anything directly to the plot. This is part of the Vachss effort to educate the reader but we probably didn't need quite so many examples. Vachss inserts them at a pause in the action and, as a result they distract. They primarily tell about violence against women, an important awareness, but come off like a commercial interrupting the story.

Here is a short exchange that, I think, shows some of who Burke is. As the main character, Burke has the most character development but it does not come in chunks, only bits as the series moves along.
"You know what happens when a raccoon gets his leg caught in one of those steel traps, Herk? You know what he's got to do, he wants to live?"
"Bite the leg off?" the big man said.
"Yeah. There's two kinds of raccoons get caught in those traps. The ones with balls enough to do what they gotta do. And dead ones. A bitch raccoon gets in heat, she wants a stud that's gonna give her the strongest babies, understand? You know what she looks for? Not the biggest raccoon. Not the prettiest one either. A smart bitch, she looks for the one with three legs."
I enjoy reading the Burke series and expect to continue to its conclusion. After all, I already have all the remaining books. At the end of this book I wonder if Burke's new love will make the cut and appear in the next story. With the words of a Michael Jackson song turned on their head, I await the development of Burke: I'm a fighter, not a lover. It seems to me that in this book Vachss has begun to portray Burke more as a violent criminal than as a crusader for the abused child. I am looking forward to the next book to see if that trend continues.

A strong minority of me wants to give Safe House four stars, but I am going to go with my majority and limit myself to three. I want more child abusers and their victims. I want fewer Nazi skin heads. I want Burke to more regularly charge in and save the good guy rather than kill the bad guy.