The Devil's Backbone - Hardcover

Greer, Robert O.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 089296653X ISBN 13: 9780892966530

Publisher: Mysterious Pr, 1998

Synopsis

There were only two things that terrified retired black rodeo star and all-around gadfly Hambone Dolbey. One of them was water. So when Hambone's lifeless body was found floating in a wet suit, those who knew him best knew for sure that the cowboy had been murdered.
Two of them, a deaf-mute old rodeo clown and a former bull rider, ask CJ Floyd to find the killer. CJ has just chased down a rail-thin bail-jumper named Bobby Two-Shirts, earning himself a $3,000 finder's fee, a vicious bite, and a new enemy: Bobby's beautiful, long-legged sister. Driving bare-breasted through the desert heat, she is in hot pursuit of the man who put her brother away.
Now CJ has to watch his back and his front. He discovers Hambone Dolbey's colorful career included a kinky, forbidden, and potentially dangerous affair, and unearths a trail of deals and greed pointing to the mountainous land mass known as the Devil's Backbone. But while CJ hunts a murderer who has already struck twice, Bobby Two-Shirts's sister is laying a trap...

About this title

About the Author

Robert Greer is a Professor of Pathology at the University of Colorado Health Sciences Center.

Reviews

CJ Floyd, Denver bail bondsman and sometime bounty hunter, has double trouble in his third adventure (after The Devil's Red Nickel, 1997.) Two friends ask CJ to find the killer of their pal Hambone Dolbey, a retired black rodeo star who claimed to have discovered diamonds on his rocky patch of land north of Denver. Oil executives Whitaker Rodgers and Evelyn Coleman had been dickering over the property rights with Dolbey in the months before his death. Dolbey may have had other enemies, including white riders jealous of his rodeo success, and his recently acknowledged son from a long-ago affair with a teenage girl. Meantime, CJ has hauled in bail jumper Bobby Two Shirts, whose homicidally devoted sister, Celeste Deepstream, decides to make CJ pay dearly for his trouble. As a black man investigating the troubled intersection of black and white societies, CJ faces special problems. Greer treats the racial issues with great skill, never turning preachy, letting CJ, the rest of the clearly etched cast and a well-wrought story lead the way. Author tour.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Anybody who knew retired black rodeo-rider Cletus (Hambone) Dolbey's fear of water can tell he must have been onto an awfully big payoff to be outfitting himself in a wet suit preparatory to getting himself beaten to death with a branding iron. And long before Denver bail bondsman CJ Floyd (The Devil's Red Nickel, p. 97, etc.) has figured out just what Hambone was looking for on his arid tract of upcountry heaven near the range of hills called the Devil's Backbone, he has a pretty good idea who was in on the search along with him: Pandeco oil president Whitaker Rodgers, so firmly under his CEO mother's thumb and so starved for cash that he'd be receptive to just about any wildcat scheme that promised a quick return. Unfortunately, Rodgers isn't the only person who might have wanted to kill Hambone; there's also Rebecca Baptiste, Hambone's tempestuous former lover, and her (and Hambone's) son; Percy Lewis, the rodeo rider who blamed his career-ending injury on Hambone; and all the Pandeco sharks lined up behind Rodgers. Despite getting warned off repeatedly by the law, CJ vows to get to the bottom of Hambone's death--not knowing he's already got his hands full with Celeste Deepstream, the vengeful and resourceful twin sister of a lowlife that CJ's just hauled back to Denver. Less ambitious and more fast-moving and streamlined than CJ's first two cases, though there are still enough interesting suspects in Hambone's killing for an entire page of the Denver phone book. -- Copyright ©1998, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

Through three installments, Greer has established CJ Floyd, Denver bail bondsman, bounty hunter, and reluctant sleuth, as one of the crime genre's emerging stars. The Floyd series boasts an appealing African American hero who combines toughness with charm; a wonderfully realized western setting; and perhaps best of all, a fascinating look at a particular way of life in each adventure. In The Devil's Red Nickel , the world of rhythm 'n' blues was the focus, and here it's the escapades of a few pioneering black rodeo stars, one of whom, Hambone Dolbey, has turned up murdered at the Greeley Stampede. Two of Hambone's rodeo buddies hire CJ to investigate, and the trail leads to the Devil's Backbone, a peculiar rock formation north of Denver where an illicit diamond-mining operation is gearing up. Crisp plotting and a nice cantering pace make this easy reading for mainstream mystery fans. Remarkably, CJ isn't Denver's only fictional bounty hunter: Michael Stone's Streeter also tracks bad guys for pay. See the Read-alikes column on the opposite page for other Denver sleuths Bill Ott

Denver's only black bounty hunter, C.J. Floyd, tries to find the killer of a retired black rodeo star. The fact that a vengeful woman is stalking Floyd at the same time adds spice to a winning series (The Devil's Red Nickel, LJ
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: Mysterious Pr
• Publication date: 1998
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 089296653X
• ISBN 13: 9780892966530
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 352