Long Shadows in Victory: A Harry Starbranch Mystery - Hardcover

Bean, Gregory

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0312143486 ISBN 13: 9780312143480

Publisher: St Martins Pr, 1996

Synopsis

Harry Starbranch - the former Denver homicide detective who sought a better life as chief of police in the small Wyoming mountain town of Victory - is back. This time, the peace of his tranquil community in the foothills of the Snowy Range is broken when the discovery of a woman's skeleton sets off a chain of events that leads to the brutal torture and murder of a local eccentric and the killing of the son of an affluent Chicago businessman.
Harry polishes his rusty detective skills and tries to solve the crimes, but finds himself and his partner - a huge Teton Sioux named Frankie Bull - drawn further and further into the racist world of right-wing militants who shoot first and ask questions later. As this timely and bloody tale moves toward its deadly conclusion, Harry finds that despite his cunning and determination, he can't always protect his friends and neighbors from the racial and political violence simmering in America's heartland. Sometimes, he can barely protect himself.

About this title

From Kirkus Reviews

A second chapter in the turbulent life of Harry Starbranch (No Comfort in Victory, 1995), whose dead-end job as police chief in sleepy Victory, Wyoming, was to be a near-total respite from the rigors of policing in Denver. When scrawny loner and odd-job man Sonny Toms finds the skeleton of a pregnant woman in an old mine shaft, there are instant repercussions. The skeleton disappears, and Sonny is found dead in his trailer--tortured, his throat slashed. Harry must now contend with pompous, inept County Sheriff Anthony Baldi and the sudden appearance of old friend Ken Keegan, of the Wyoming Department of Criminal Investigation, who shows up with FBI agent Aaron Cohen in tow. They inform Harry of their suspicions that the right-wing Posse Comitatus is stockpiling weapons in Victory, possibly in cahoots with summer resident Wolfgang Bauer, a brewery mogul whose grandson Tad is presently occupying the estate, along with a bodyguard. Tad's recent, now ex, girlfriend Ellen Vaughn, an anthropology student, is briefly a suspect in Sonny's murder, but then Tad and bodyguard are found shot to death. Harry, helped by lone deputy Frankie Bull, takes the job of finding the killer as a personal challenge, barely escaping his own demise in the confrontations to come. Lots of profane and bloody action; lots of explicit sex, as Harry sheds girlfriends in yet another attempt to reconcile with ex-wife Nicole. The pace is slowed by rambling descriptions of Wyoming's scenic wonders, weather and road conditions, and a zillion high-caloric meals at Ginny Larsen's Country Kitchen. Still, the solid plot, warm, folksy style, and endearingly fallible Harry will engage most readers to the finish. -- Copyright ©1996, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

From Publishers Weekly

In his second appearance (after No Comfort in Victory), Harry Starbranch, who left his pressure-packed Denver PD job to become chief of police in quiet little Victory, Wyo., joins the swelling ranks of mystery protagonists grappling with right-wing racists in the West. Harry's career calm shatters when a long-dead body turns up in a nearby mine shaft and, shortly thereafter, the local junk collector who found it is tortured and murdered. Meanwhile, vandals target a Jewish hardware store owner and a Mexican chicken farmer. When the FBI arrives to investigate the Posse Comitatus, militants whose antigovernment rhetoric is tinged with racism, Harry fears that a larger force is behind the outbreak of crime in Victory. Tad Bauer, a rich summer visitor, apparently supports the Posse. He also beats his ex-girlfriend, Ellen Vaughn, for whom the divorced Harry develops romantic feelings. When Bauer and his bodyguard are butchered, the boorish county sheriff arrests Ellen. Working to clear her, Harry and fellow officer Frankie Tall Bull face a snowy trap that may kill them before they can unmask the murderer. Harry's chatty narration sometimes slows the action, but it nicely evokes a close-knit Western town. Bean, a former newspaper reporter, weaves in history of authentic militant groups, adding timely realism.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: St Martins Pr
• Publication date: 1996
• ISBN 10: 0312143486
• ISBN 13: 9780312143480
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 324