When Old Men Die: A Truman Smith Mystery (Walker Mystery) - Hardcover

Crider, Bill

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0802731953 ISBN 13: 9780802731951

Publisher: Walker & Co, 1994

Synopsis

Truman Smith is happily fishing off a Galveston pier when his friend Dino seeks him out and asks for some help: Outside Harry, an old-timer with connections to Dino's family, is missing.
Smith doesn't want to have anything to do with it; the last time he looked for a missing person the outcome left something to be desired. But Dino has a way of being persuasive, and Tru promises to give it a day or two.
When the first person he questions is murdered, and when he himself is shot at, Truman Smith is reminded of all the reasons he hates missing person cases. But he's committed now: Outside Harry's life is in his hands, and Smith is going to see to it that if Harry has any secrets he wants to tell, he won't have to take them to an early grave.

About this title

About the Author

Bill Crider is the chairman of the English and Fine Arts Department at Alvin Community College.

Reviews

When Truman Smith, Crider's Texas Gulf Coast semiretired PI, muses, "feeling guilt is one of the things I do best," readers will not argue. Smith, who last felt inadequate in Gator Kill, can't find Outside Harry, well-known indigent of Galveston Island, whose missing status was first noticed by Smith's boyhood chum Dino. Dino, agoraphobic scion of the family of "uncles" that once ran the Island's now defunct gambling casino, hires his pal to find Harry. In the course of the search, which meanders around the Island and involves a couple of generations of colorful characters, the ex-bodyguard of one of the uncles is shot dead and another homeless man is killed. Smith, attacked a few times himself, uncovers and defeats a trio of murderers. The guilt-ridden Smith, who reads Look Homeward, Angel and listens to Elvis recordings, doesn't evoke much sympathy here, though he does solve some crimes and get Dino out of the house.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Galveston, Tex., shamus Truman Smith, the slowest-moving of Crider's three series detectives (Gator Kill, 1992, etc.), reluctantly agrees to search for Outside Harry Mercer, a destitute homeless man who turns out to be the most popular fellow on the island. His friend Dino, Truman's client, is looking for him, of course, but so are his homeless buddy Ro-Jo (who thinks Harry might be holed up in The Island Retreat, an abandoned gambling den once run by the uncles, Galveston's homegrown illegal city fathers); ruined millionaire Patrick Lytle (who tells Truman he wants to give Harry a home on his skeletal estate); and Alex Minor (who says he's a lawyer working for Harry's sister). About the only folks who don't seem to be looking for Harry are Truman's boss, bail bondsman Wally Zintner, and his big, nasty bounty hunter Dale Becker-- except, of course, that they are. Why the sudden flutter of interest in forgettable Harry? Truman sneaks enough time away from his current reading--Look Homeward Angel, a great book for guys who aren't in a hurry--to tie Harry, together with Braddy Macklin, the onetime uncles' bodyguard he finds dead in The Retreat, to a plan to bring gambling back to the island. Shambling and shapeless, with lots of shooting in darkened rooms in lieu of the kind of suspense that might be sparked by your wanting to know what happened to people you care about. -- Copyright ©1994, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

Truman "Tru" Smith is a PI who'd rather be reading Faulkner or fishing on his beloved Galveston Island than solving mysteries, so when his friend Dino asks for help, Tru at first demurs. With some not-very-subtle arm twisting, Dino finally persuades Tru to investigate the disappearance of Old Harry, a homeless vagrant whom Dino and his family have "adopted." Tru makes some half-hearted efforts to find the old geezer--who Tru figures probably disappeared because he felt like it--but only succeeds in getting shot at, doused in the Gulf, and bopped on the head. Of course, these events not only make Tru cross, they also rouse his suspicions about why somebody is so determined to keep him from finding out the real reasons for Old Harry's disappearance. It's not long before Tru discovers that some very nasty business is going on--business that isn't in the best interests of Tru's island. Crider has been favorably compared to mystery superstar author Robert Parker, and it's easy to see why. His writing features some of the same subtle humor, crisp dialogue, and intriguing plots, and his intelligent hero is a less glib and glamorous but still appealing version of the popular Spenser. Fine entertainment. Emily Melton

Edition details

• Publisher: Walker & Co
• Publication date: 1994
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0802731953
• ISBN 13: 9780802731951
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 192