Brown on Brown - Manuel Ramos

Another novel by Manuel Ramos. More excellent work. Prose as smooth as jazz. Smooth jazz, not that unsmooth stuff. This time the plot was complicated enough to confuse me. I'm not sure that's a good thing, but I like seeing Luis Montez squirm and he certainly did that here. There is also a real social issue at play with part of the plot centering on southwest water rights. For a native New Yorker it's a little hard to imagine that anyone is still fighting over that kind of thing -- are people still killing over the sheep vs cows issue? But I remember being in Alburquerque a few years ago when a bunch of people were running for mayor and the main question was how the town would be getting its water in the future. All the candidates said they'd get it from a nearby Indian tribe. Sounded ominous.

Anyway, Brown on Brown -- racial tension, water wars, love with a woman who later tries to kill you (could Luis be that unlucky? Maybe it wasn't him. Read the book yourself and see.) what else could anyone want?