Rumble Tumble by Joe R. Lansdale

(hb; 1998: fifth book in the Hap and Leonard series)

From the back cover:

"Hap Collins is hitting the hard edge of a midlife crisis. By night, he's bouncing at a local club. By day, he's living by the grace of his best friend -- black, gay Vietnam vet Leonard Pine -- and his good woman, former Sweet Potato Queen Brett Sawyer. Hap may be down, but he's a long throw from out.

"That's the good news. He'll need it for the bad news.

"Brett's daughter, Tillie, who is turning tricks and taking drugs, stands in need of a quick and merciful rescue. It will be no easy chore, starting with a hard trek from mosquito-ridden but familiar LaBorde, Texas, to the fleshpots and hardasses of Hootie Hoot, Oklahoma.

"On the road the trio picks up new friends, like a hulking Pentecostal preacher and retired hitman, as well as fresh enemies, including a redheaded midget with a giant chip on his shoulder and an army of bikers turned vice profiteers and cold-blooded killers."

Review:

Rumble is one of my favorite Hap and Leonard novels thus far. Like previous books, it is an excellent, entertaining pulp stew of action, cinematic-worthy and humorous dialogue, bigger-than-life characters and bloody action. At the heart of Rumble, as with other Hap and Leonard works, the core of the book is the titular characters' banter-punctuated sense of brotherhood.

This is worth owning, as are the previous novels in this series -- Rumble is followed by Veil's Visit: a Taste of Hap and Leonard (a side-story anthology, an expensive collector's item) and Captains Outrageous.