Note: This novel is the second work in a series. If you plan to read the first novel in the series, Boise Longpig Hunting Club, reviewed here, be aware that the following contains spoilers for that book.
When I finished Nick Kolakowski’s riveting thriller Boise Longpig Hunting Club, I was eager for a sequel. Over the course of that novel, the central characters–bounty hunter Jake Halligan, his gun-running sister, Frankie, and Jake’s fiancée, Janine–became prey in a “Most Dangerous Game”-style hunt orchestrated by a corrupt and powerful billionaire, Ted Baker, who’d blamed the death of his coke-dealing brother on Jake and Frankie’s late father, a former deputy. Though the trio ended up slaughtering their way to freedom, one thing seemed clear by the novel’s conclusion: When you kill a man like Baker, along with his rich and influential fellow hunters, there are bound to be consequences.
Fortunately for readers like me, Kolakowski just released Rattlesnake Rodeo, a gripping sequel that unleashes these consequences with force, pushing Jake and Frankie into uncomfortable new territory, physically and morally.
The start of the novel finds Jake, Frankie, and Janine on the run and trying to destroy evidence that might implicate them in the killings of the first book. They’re also seeking out anything that could give them an advantage over any allies of Ted Baker who might be on their trail. One possible advantage: Baker’s nephew, Keith, who’s found hiding out in his late uncle’s basement. Jake and Frankie see Keith as a potential bargaining chip and source of information. But on the latter front, Keith’s overconsumption of pot brownies has rendered him incoherent and therefore close to useless–or so it seems. When he mentions a “goddess” named Karen who is “going to come down from Eden and slaughter you all,” it’s easy to assume that this mythical figure is just a product of his drugged-up imagination. But before long, Jake and Frankie learn that she’s very real.
When Jake, with Frankie’s help, returns home for money and passports, he expects that danger will await him, and he’s not disappointed. Though he’s able to take most of the home invaders out of action, one of them–a woman who turns out to be Ted Baker’s sister, Karen Baker–holds all the cards she needs to survive, and if everything goes her way, to get something she wants from Jake and Frankie. A former prosecutor who rivals her late brother in wealth and influence, Karen has accessed computer files that give her all the information she needs to implicate Jake, Frankie, and Janine in the murders of Ted and his fellow hunters. And she knows that surviving allies of Ted will want the trio killed, if the news gets out. But, as she tells Jake and Frankie, if they do a “job” for her, “I’ll make sure that every trace of this situation is buried so deep that nobody will ever find it.”
The “job” would have Jake and Frankie killing an innocent person for reasons that aren’t clear to them at first. I won’t say anything more about Karen’s target or about the reasons she wants this person dead. But I will say that like Boise Longpig Hunting Club, Rattlesnake Rodeo vividly illustrates the ways in which wealth and power can enable, and sometimes even encourage, ruthlessness. This aspect of Rattlesnake Rodeo–and also the way Kolakowski explores the injustice surrounding a police shooting of a young Black man–makes the novel especially timely and relevant.
Although Jake and Frankie don’t hesitate to kill when personally threatened, they just can’t stomach Karen’s request, putting them and Janine in even graver danger. To evade it, they must overcome a series of physical and tactical challenges that rival the ones they faced in the first novel. These action sequences, which deliver lots of thrills, are relieved by welcome doses of humor throughout. As one example, Jake makes this observation about a difficult episode in his past:
Things do indeed get worse for Jake–and also for Frankie and Janine. The ways that they think through and confront the ever-shifting challenges, sometimes literally under fire, help make Rattlesnake Rodeo an engaging and satisfying read.
Would My Pick be Your Pick?
If you're interested in ________, the answer may be "Yes":￭ Thrillers or tales of suspense
￭ Cat-and-mouse stories
￭ The consequences of racial injustice in policing
