High Desert Barbecue - J.D. Tuccille

   2011; 264 pages.  Full Title: High Desert Barbecue: A Tale of Suspense, Pyromania and Sexual Tension.  New Author? : Yes.  Genre : Action & Adventure; Humorous Fiction; Arizona.  Overall Rating : 6*/10.

 

    Meet Rollo.  He’s what you’d call a loner.  That’s not quite a hermit, but pretty close to it.

 

    Rollo lives by himself in a shack way out in the mountains of northern Arizona.  It’s about a day’s hike from the small city of Williams, Arizona.  He’s not bothering anybody.

 

    Well, that’s not quite accurate.  His one mistake is that he’s living on public land.  In a National Forest, to be specific.  The Forest Service doesn’t like that.

 

    Which is why they’ve just burnt down Rollo’s shack and commandeered his truck.  Rollo just barely escaped into the woods before they grabbed him.  Now what’s he gonna do?

 

    Hey, is that a Forest Service Chevy Blazer parked just over there?  It’s a much classier truck than Rollo’s old heap.  I wonder how fast it would get him into Flagstaff, where Rollo’s friend Scott lives?

 

What’s To Like...

    High Desert Barbecue is essentially a book-long chase with the bad guys—the Forest Service rangers and some of their friends with common interests—running over the rivers and through the canyons while chasing Rollo, Scott, and Scott’s girlfriend Lani.

 

    The entire story takes place in the greater Flagstaff area, most of it in a place called Sycamore Canyon.  My college roommate was from that area and places cited in High Desert Barbecue such as Mingus Mountain, Clarkdale, and the Mogollon Rim bring back fond memories.  I’m even familiar with the tiny speck of a village called Cornville, which is part of the address of the book’s publishing house.

 

    The Forest Service team bears a close resemblance to the Keystone Kops.  Our three heroes may be outgunned, outmanned, out-communicated, and out-vehicled, but when you’ve got a living-in-the-wild geezer like Rollo on your side, you’ve got a fighting chance.

 

    Both sides are “co-ed”, which explains the subtitle’s reference to sexual tension.  J.D. Tuccille obviously has great tastes in music, since Toby Keith, The Pogues, and the J. Geils Band all get mentioned.  The Flagstaff riots made me chuckle, especially since hippies are one of the groups involved.  And the whole concept of “eco-erotica” was a hoot.

 

    The ending is a bit forced, but adequate.  The prolonged chase finally comes to an end, and the perpetrators of the pyromania are revealed to all.  Our happy but beleaguered protagonists are alive and off the hook.  High Desert Barbecue is a standalone novel and not part of any series.  There’s room for a sequel (one or more of the baddies get away), but I seriously doubt J.D. Tuccille is contemplating one.

 Things That Sound Dirty But Aren’t…

    “I have powerful lungs from all the bike-riding I do.  I can suck as long and hard as you want.”  (loc. 891)

Ratings…

    Amazon:  4.0/5 based on 29 ratings and 26 reviews.

    Goodreads: 3.38/5 based on 45 ratings and 4 reviews.

Excerpts...

    “He don’t do so well in all his classes like he does in yours.”  She shrugged.  “He don’t do so well in summer school either.”

    Lani grimaced sympathetically.

    “I’m sorry about that Mrs. Begay.  I wish I could help, but there’s not much I can do about summer school.”

    Ozzie tugged at Lani’s shirt.

    “They don’t let me cut class like you do.”

    “Ummm … Let’s call it independent study, Ozzie.  Not cutting class.”  (loc. 216)

 

    Lani stood with a steaming metal cup in her hand, which she handed to Scott.  He took the cup and elaborately kissed her hand.

    “So we’re being chased through Sycamore Canyon by a pyro death cult?  How likely is that?”

    Rollo grumbled in obvious agreement.

    Scott sipped his coffee and sighed.

    “Well … it’s a lot more likely than the idea that we stumbled on a band of naked homicidal rangers holding a torch-lit forest-burning ceremony.”  (loc. 2102)

 

Kindle Details…

    High Desert Barbecue sells for $2.99 at Amazon.  It’s the only e-book offered by J.D. Tuccille, although there’s another dozen books or so under what's apparently his alternate nom de plume, Jerome Tuccille..

 

“Rollo!  I’m— Oh my God.  Did you set fire to your underwear?”  (loc. 2940)

    There are some quibbles.  From most nitpicky to least:

 

    The cussing frequency is moderate (14 instances in the first 10%), there’s a couple rolls in the hay, and a small amount of ancient marijuana, long past its expiration date, but which eventually becomes a factor in the storyline.

 

    There’s the usual number of typos and grammar errors that crop up in almost any indie author book, including things like paper weight/paperweight, on-coming/oncoming, here/her, and a place called Parsons/Parson Spring.  But they weren't frequent enough to become a distraction.

 

    The biggest problem for me was the overly convenient aspects of the storyline.  When our heroes need bigger and badass-er firepower; a cache conveniently appears.  When they’re about to be busted for shooting somebody; a distracting felony conveniently arises.  The appearance of such “deus ex machina” occurrences means that literary tension never builds as the ending approaches.

 

    And last but not least, the dog dies.

 

    6 Stars.  The main thing to keep in mind when reading High Desert Barbecue is that it’s primarily a piece of Humorous Fiction.  Are things too convenient?  Are the bad guys too unbelievably inept?  Yes and yes.  But that just contributes to the wit and comedy in the story, and in that respect I thought the book did okay.