Gator Kill (A Truman Smith Mystery) - Hardcover

After he failed to find his missing sister, whose remains finally turned up in a bag in an overgrown field, Texas PI Truman Smith retired to become a housepainter on Galveston Island. But when an alligator is killed and its carcass left on display on a family friend's property, Tru is persuaded to search for the culprit. Soon the brooding gumshoe is stumbling over the bodies of dead humans, is shot at and run down by a souped-up four-by-four as he's embroiled in a plot complete with crooked police, a possible land-grabbing sheme and bad guys who, but for their lack of redeeming good nature, could be Damon Runyon inventions. Crider ( Too Late to Die ) places his likable, laid-back and offbeat series hero in an easygoing Gulf Coast setting, with Galveston acting as a poor man's New Orleans. Fans and new readers alike will hope Crider's reluctant PI, who would be happy reading the complete works of William Faulkner in the company of his cat Nameless, can be coaxed out of retirement again.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Crider's laconic part-time Texas p.i. Truman Smith (Dead on the Island, etc.) takes on a job for old-timer friend Fred Benton. Fred and wife Mary own a huge chunk of Texas backwoods, a lot of it swampland. Someone has killed and skinned one of Fred's beloved alligators, leaving the carcass to rot, and he wants Truman to find out who and why. Other oddball things have been happening on Fred's property--strange noises and strange vehicles, one of them a Ford truck that attacks like an army tank. Truman survives the truck, barrages of bullets, and an underwater swim with ravenous gators before he finally figures out who the nasty villain is and what he's up to. Lots of swamp lore and a familiar plot--a sluggish performance, overall, in Crider's laid-back, good ol' boys style. -- Copyright ©1992, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.