1994 – Dirty White Boys
Literary Guild Featured Selection
A Bob Lee Swagger book – sort of.
They busted out of McAlester State Penitentiary–three escaped convicts going to ground in a world unprepared for anything like them….Lamar Pye is prince of the Dirty White Boys. With a lion in his soul, he roars–for he is the meanest, deadliest animal on the loose…. Odell is Lamar’s cousin, a hulking manchild with unfeeling eyes. He lives for daddy Lamar. Surely he will die for him….Richard’s survival hangs on a sketch: a crude drawing of a lion and a half-naked woman. For this Lamar has let Richard live…
Armed to the teeth, Lamar and his boys have cut a path of terror across the Southwest, and pushed one good cop into a crisis of honor and conscience. Trooper Bud Pewtie should have died once at Lamar’s hands. Now they’re about to meet again. And this time, only one of them will walk away….
They busted out of McAlester State Penitentiary–three escaped convicts going to ground in a world unprepared for anything like them….Lamar Pye is prince of the Dirty White Boys. With a lion in his soul, he roars–for he is the meanest, deadliest animal on the loose…. Odell is Lamar’s cousin, a hulking manchild with unfeeling eyes. He lives for daddy Lamar. Surely he will die for him….Richard’s survival hangs on a sketch: a crude drawing of a lion and a half-naked woman. For this Lamar has let Richard live…
Armed to the teeth, Lamar and his boys have cut a path of terror across the Southwest, and pushed one good cop into a crisis of honor and conscience. Trooper Bud Pewtie should have died once at Lamar’s hands. Now they’re about to meet again. And this time, only one of them will walk away….
Stephen Hunter on Dirty White Boys:I had a hunger – literally, a taste in my mouth – for a work that would be starker, more driven, than my earlier books. I knew also that I wanted it ‘American’ somehow. I wanted a plot that gripped like a vise, expressed in a voice of lyric plainness. I wanted lots of violence, gunfights so incandescent they felt like fever dreams and left you sweaty. And when someone died, I wanted you to feel the pain.What I saw was a modern Western lawman, a state trooper; I saw boots and Berettas; I saw his family and his struggle to be a decent man at war with his impulses to be a satisfied one. I knew his name would be Bud. And I knew he’d be hunting an escaped convict.
And I saw that man, too – Lamar Pye. He was everything other men secretly admire: He was as without fear as he was without remorse. In a kinder world, he’d have been a great soldier, an athlete. In the world into which he was born, he’d become a criminal, a bad, bad boy who would know only one thing about life: what to do next.
With these two men – competing priests in the cult of manhood – the book took off and wrote itself. I wasn’t its author but its recording secretary.
You can help support my volunteer website to chronicle Stephen Hunter’s writings by buying Master Sniper from Amazon.com. You pay the same – but I get a small commission. Click the image at left to buy the paperback, and thanks for your support!
December 8th, 2006 at 1:52 pm
Like many Hunter fans, I read “Point of Impact” first. It had been out for a few years but I didn’t even know it.
I’m now REreading all of the Swagger (Dad&Son) books and am getting even more out of them the second time around.
My favorite though is “Dirty White Boys”.
I think it would make a great movie except that it would have to rival “Gone With the Wind” in length.
I really liked all of ‘em, including the one NOT listed on this site, “Havana”.
Gringo/Downingtown, Pa
July 14th, 2008 at 9:23 pm
Do you know the order of his Earl/Swagger novels? I know it says on sites, but incorrectly. I wanna know what’s a sequel or prequal to what in both the Earl swagger and Bob Swagger series.
July 14th, 2008 at 10:01 pm
Here you go.
September 20th, 2008 at 8:56 am
Is Vern Pye from NIGHT OF THUNDER related to Lamar Pye from DIRTY WHITE BOYS?
September 27th, 2008 at 4:04 pm
Hi. Can anyone tell me how Dirty White Boys is related to Bob Lee Swagger? The only relationship between them I can see is that at the end of Hot Springs when Earl is holding baby Bob Lee and the two boys appear and he gets them lemonade. They are Bub and Jimmy Pye. Any advice?
October 3rd, 2008 at 10:00 am
Angela, the connection is made in two places. The first one you found is at the end of Hot Springs like you mentioned. You then have to read Black Light which sheds more light on the Earl and Bob Swagger connection to Dirty White Boys.
October 6th, 2008 at 2:23 am
Angela;
You need to read Black Light it ties so many things together and you go ‘ah-ha’ a lot because you finally realize stuff. SH should have called Black Light ‘Crystal Clear’
To make it short it IS related to Earl and Bob Lee Swagger
November 29th, 2008 at 6:57 pm
If we look at it throughout the history of all the books Earl and Bob Lee have killed some kin over the years.
March 5th, 2009 at 5:45 pm
I’ve read all of Mr. Hunter’s books. Dirty White Boys was, in my opinion, the best. I say this because the characters were a bit more three dimensional than in some of his other novels, everything flowed very smoothly, and the bad guys were both credible as bad guys and REALLY BAD. Except for some of the characters who carry on into his other novels, this story sort of stands alone.
I hope Mr. Hunter writes another novel using Bud Pewtie’s son as the main character. Let Bobby Lee Swagger take a supporting role for a change. Best wishes to all.
March 26th, 2009 at 6:26 am
All I can say is wow what a book DIRTY WHITE BOYS I think it would make a great movie for a director like Rob Zombie, Quinton Terontino or Robert Rodrigez !!!! Remember me Mr. Hunter cause i think if ether one of these directors touched it, it would make millions!!! Maybe its just me I read it 3 times
May 15th, 2009 at 8:44 pm
I agree this book should be a movie. I can't think of a more memorable 'villain' than Lamar Pye, even including Hannibal Lecter. The juxtaposition between Bud and Lamar and their 'families' was just fantastic. I'm a hopeful novelist myself and this is one of the works I look up to and take inspiration from. Great job, Mr. Hunter!
June 18th, 2009 at 7:26 pm
lamar pye is the bst character ever to be bad guy,if stephen hunter ever decides to write about lamar in prison i would be a very happy man indeed.
could you imagine what lamar would have been like had he been to the 'nam'now that is my fantasy story so come on mr hunter use a little poetic license and produce another lamar pye story please.
June 21st, 2009 at 7:48 pm
What would really make me happy is to see Frenchy Short get his just desserts from Bob
June 30th, 2009 at 6:58 am
Dirty white Boys is a masterpiece in violence and payback.
July 25th, 2009 at 7:30 pm
frenchy short should double cross lamar and suffer the consequences,lamar is bob the nailer without remorse.
August 11th, 2009 at 4:16 pm
I read DWB first then went back to POI and finally BL… I came to SH after an online recommendation from Will Beall, the author of LA Rex (another novel that I think many readers of SH would highly enjoy) and haven't looked back.
Just finished the Earl trilogy of HS/PHC and H and am in the first few pages of TTH. My only complaint (and biggest compliment) is that once I start a SH novel I literally can NOT get anything else accomplished until I finish reading it! SH certainly exhibits a real expertise at ratcheting up the tension until the smoke rolls off your forehead (in my most recent example- the finale- or dare I say- the coup de grace of "Havana."
Kudos to Mr. Hunter (and our webmaster) for their efforts in behalf of this grateful reader. I wish my beloved late uncle, William V. (a Korean combat veteran) who shared my love of thrillers, had also had the opportunity to discover Earl, Bud, and Bob Lee.
March 6th, 2010 at 12:38 am
This was my first Hunter novel. It was recommened in the letters page of the PREACHER comic by it’s writer Garth Ennis: “Read the first line and if you do not buy it, I will buy it for you” (HEAVILY paraphrased!)… This is one of the best recommendations ever as Hunter has become a favorite author and I devour his books. I read “Dirty…” then “Point Of Impact” and “Black Light” right after. I loved making the connections between the Swagger character in “POI” and his father only briefly mentioned here. The gunplay writing in this is a REVELATION. You really feel the fear and frenzy of bullets flying in every direction.
Lamar’s description to Richard for his future tatoo: “He’s a lion…” is one of the greatest lines in all of literature! Hahaha! Lamar is that great character that is just BAD, but you enjoy how good he is at it! You are rooting for Bud because he is on the side of “right,” but you kinda want him to get kicked in the nuts, too…
March 7th, 2010 at 11:03 pm
could you list the chronological order of all earl & bobby lee’s adventure
March 12th, 2010 at 12:50 pm
I picked up DWB at the library before I knew how good the author was. I thought it would be a slam against gun and country people so I put it back on the shelf. How wrong can one person be?
The best thing about Hunter country is the lines and images that stay with you and make you want to go back to them again and again. If the first line of this one does not grab you, you may be as wrong as I was, once.
Eventually, the Pyes and Grumleys (see Hot Springs)lose. The real life Swaggers and Pewties, flawed as they are, leaving casualties along the way, are the reason. . They are the backbone of this great country, and Hunter is as good at telling their story as we have today.
(If you think there are no real Earl or Bob Swagger google “John Basilone medal of honor citation”)
March 15th, 2010 at 9:50 am
I just finished DWBs. The climactic battle at the end had me short of breath,palms sweaty, heart beating fast. And I’m 59yrs old! Needless to say, Mr. Hunter is one of the best fiction writers whom I’ve read . I just recently discovered him. I’m on my third book of his now – Point of Impact – and a total fan. I can tell when someone enjoys and is dedicated to the craft of writing.
May 26th, 2010 at 11:12 am
Just finished listening to I, Sniper. Went searching internet for a place to put my comments. Found this one! Yeah! Also found several comments about the inaccuracies of I, Sniper. If you have a way of letting Stephen Hunter know that there is a 63 year old lady who first found his book, Dirty White Boys, riveting escapism style exciting and fell in thrall to his Swagger characters, it would be appreciated. He is the first author since Frank Yerby that I have followed so closely. Thank you for listening. I hope anyone taking the time to read this will understand the adjectives used to describe and defend his work.
September 14th, 2010 at 7:57 pm
I have read all of Mr. Hunter’s novels and they will rob you of sleep so beware! He reaches out and grabs you and doesn’t let go. I like them all very much and Earl and Bob Swagger are my favorite good – guy characters.
That brings us to Lamar Pye. The best bad guy of all time. Dirty White Boys is still my absolute favorite by SH. Still can’t believe Tarantino hasn’t filmed it.
Just finished 47th Samurai. Outstanding, as usual. In Minneapolis we have a great Japanese restaurant just down the street that has excellent saki served piping hot. Thank You for reminding me Mr. Hunter!
October 25th, 2010 at 12:53 am
Dirty White Boys was very interesting to me, as I grew up in Oklahoma, and have been to all the places mentioned in the book. I lived in Lawton for about 7 years. Mr. Hunter has done most of his geography studies quite well, but I have to point out: Geronimo, OK is not 45 miles from Lawton. If it had been I couldn’t have lived in Lawton and attended high school at Geronimo.
Also, Mr. Hunter mentions the existence of tattoo parlors along Ft. Sill Blvd. Oklahoma did not have tattoo parlors (at least legal ones) in the time period of the book. I’m guessing late ’70′s or early 80′s.
Neither of these discrepencies detract from the book, I still enjoyed it very much, and I doubt more than a fraction of a percent of readers noticed it anyway.