David A Williams
Martha Collins, gardening editor for a Dallas-Fort Worth newspaper is stunned when she is offered an interview with “The Man”, a convicted murderer on Death Row whose date with destiny is two short days away. “The Man” has never granted an interview, has never talked about the murder. No one knows his identity or his background. Martha, transplanted five years ago from Boston to the Lone Star State, is the only person he will talk to. She uncovers a dark and sorrowful past, the mystery of which is as deep as a Texas River, and as wide as the moonlit plains.
Add to this a determined governor who will do anything to get re-elected and her even stronger willed soup-making woman nemesis, a red soda pop addicted pooch, a controversy over cottonwood trees, a black rose, the torrid heat of Texas, and a repentant nurse and you have the enigma that is Strings. - the one that does the most catches the most hell for doing it.
Years ago, soon after he was hired by “Boss”, Norton Sterritt finds one of the thirty-four “vacations” of a serial killer he hoped never to encounter. Now, a recently hired deputy in Red Oak County, Texas, Sheriff Abe King sends Norton into The Oaks of Deep East Texiz for the first time. With orders to mind his manners, approach the residents therein with utmost respect for their solitary and independent lifestyle - with a strong admonition to never approach a woman, watch for velvet tails (the moniker for timber rattler in those same woods) to deliver a funeral notice to The Thomases, a family of holdouts still rooted in the culture of the first pioneers who settled the area. After a chance encounter with a rat terrier named Teenitesy, and his vexing owner, Norton finds the latest “vacation” - a small frail woman - hanging from a post oak tree on his way back to the office.
Thus begins the mystery of Norton Sterritt, who is trapped between his two masters, Boss - who throws unlimited amounts of money into the defense of the killer and Sheriff King - who is adamant justice be served.
Add to this five of the finest female rifle shots thereabout; Sheriff King's wife Clara - an avid rattlesnake devotee; a district judge who maintains his chambers in an old general store; Texas Rangers; and a ruthless assassin and you have Red Oak, a mystery wherein the ability to properly cut stove wood is essential.