The Natchez Burning Trilogy: A Penn Cage Collection Featuring: Natchez Burning, The Bone Tree, and Mississippi Blood by Greg Iles

I have been interested in reading Greg Iles for a while now. I had bought one of his books only to find that it was part of a continued series, and the book I had purchased was right in the middle of the trilogy. When the audio version of the entire trilogy came on sale, I grabbed the chance and dove in.

Better late than never. It was worth the wait. The story is brutal yet realistic and has more twists and turns than a rollercoaster. The atmosphere of the South rings true as can only come from someone who has lived there. I think I have ANOTHER favorite author.

Natchez Burning

We meet Penn Cage, a former prosecutor turned mayor. Through the memories of different characters, we are brought back to the 1960s and the tension that made the civil rights movement. A group of former Kue Klux Klan members bridge off and formed the Double Eagles, a more militant group who planned on killing Martin Luther King Jr. and Bobby Kennedy. Meanwhile, Cage’s father, a respected physician, has an affair with his African American nurse.

It is from this background that Cage and his fiancé, a reporter, find themselves trying to identify members of this domestic terrorist group and find proof that Cage’s father did not help his former lover commit suicide.

The Bone Tree

The Bone Tree is a massive cypress where the Double Eagles have allegedly tortured and murdered several African Americans. It has never been found, but Katelin, Pen’s fiancée, is determined to find it and prove that the Double Eagles were behind some of the deadliest murders in the State and are still active.

Pen works with the FBI trying to prove that Double Eagles were behind the JFK assassination while Forrest Knox, a high-ranking State Police officer and secretly a Double Eagle member, flanks them at every turn.

Mississippi Blood

In the concluding book of the trilogy, Penn’s father must fight for his freedom in a high-stakes criminal trial, while the Double Eagles try killing any evidence and witness that stands against them. Penn and his half-brother must team up to survive the encounter.

The courtroom drama is as exciting as the shootouts between the Double Eagles and their enemies, and the tension doesn’t slow down until the last page.

I highly recommend the entire series.