The Freshour Cylinders [Paperback]

Speer Morgan (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 2000

WINNER OF THE 1999 AMERICAN BOOK AWARD

Tom Freshour needs a vacation. It's the dusty, hot summer of 1934, and he'd like to escape both the heat in western Arkansas and his cases at the county prosecutor's office for the calm and solitude of a fishing trip. But his old Ford won't start, and while it's being repaired, an eccentric and enigmatic collector of Indian artifacts is brutally murdered.

It doesn't help matters that the executor of the collector's estate is Rainy Davis, a beautiful, intelligent young archaeologist who's uncertain why she was appointed to oversee the estate of a man whom she'd met only once.

Nor does it help that the most formidable county judge has asked personally that Freshour take the case.

But Freshour agrees, drawing himself into a tense and violent investigation of murder, political scandal, and some very private affairs.

In this suspenseful literary mystery, Speer Morgan takes us back to the events surrounding the discovery and destruction of the Spiro Mound, the most significant pre-Columbian temple mound ever found in North America. Weaving history with the compelling story of murder, broken hearts, and greed, Morgan gives us one of the most engrossing, sexy, and suspenseful reads of the year.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Native American assistant prosecutor Tom Freshour (last seen in The Whipping Boy, 1994) investigates a murder in Depression-era Fort Smith, Ark., on the Oklahoma border, in Morgan's Chandler-indebted fourth. The dead man, local eccentric Lee Guessner, trafficked artifacts from the famous Spiro Mound nearby, but was also involved in one of the elaborate real estate frauds that flourished at the time on former Native American lands. When lovely, smart-cookie Rainy Davis shows up as the unlikely inheritor (Lee had met her on a South American dig), she sparks Tom's love as he remembers wooing her mother. Along with trusty old court bailiff Hank, they sift through the local landscape and Native American heritage to exact justice, not only for murder, but also for crimes against Native American land, spirit and history. Years later, Tom tells the story into cylinders on an old Dictaphone machine and these are discovered later still, providing a neat framing device (and the story's title). Tom's tone shifts back and forth from sensitive outsider to marauding vigilante, but traditional characters like Tom's clueless wealthy boss, the dirty local sheriff and the judge with a secret make this a satisfying (if sometimes slow-moving) thriller with the added enjoyment of authentic depictions of Native American culture and history. (Oct.) FYI: Morgan is the editor of the Missouri Review.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From Booklist

This novel, set in dust bowl Oklahoma, has the atmosphere of a "B" movie and the flavor of Indiana Jones. The secrets of the recent past compete with the mysteries of an ancient Native American civilization. The lives of the powerful and wealthy contrast with those of the drought-stricken and abused. Tom Freshour, a half-breed, local prosecutor, is asked to investigate the murder of a local collector of artifacts. A beautiful young woman is the mysterious heir to the murdered man's collection. She and Freshour find the motives, solve the crime, and produce a just end for the guilty. Unfortunately, Morgan attempts to frame the story as reality by prefacing it with a tale of boxes of wax dictaphone cylinders found in an old bank vault. The narrative that follows is supposed to be the transcript, hence the title, but it does not read that way. However, it is easy enough to ignore this and just get on with what is otherwise a very engaging and well-written novel. Danise Hoover --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 345 pages
• Publisher: MacAdam/Cage Publishing (May 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1878448994
• ISBN-13: 978-1878448996
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5.4 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,352,369 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Born and raised in Fort Smith, Arkansas, Speer Morgan is the author of six books. His first novel, published in 1979, was set in Arkansas and the Indian Territory during the late 1800s. Among his other four novels, three have been set in Arkansas and Oklahoma - one in 1894, another in 1934, and another in the 1980s. "The Whipping Boy"(1994) was aided by an NEA Individual Fellowship in fiction. His latest novel, "The Freshour Cylinders"(1998), won Foreword Magazine's Silver Award for the best book of the year. It also won an American Book Award in 1999. His newest book of stories, in Kindel edition, is "The God Pocket." Morgan teaches in the English Department at the University of Missouri where he is director of the Creative Writing Program. He has edited The Missouri Review for 34 years.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A vivid and beautifully written novel, February 11, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: The Freshour Cylinders (Hardcover)

What a fine book The Freshour Cylinders is! It was the kind of reading experience that peopled my daydreams and nightdreams with vivid characters in exquisite detail. I felt like a time-traveller, transported to an exotic location, immersed in a time and place that, before this book, had little clarity to me. I have nothing but praise for this book -- it was thoroughly enjoyable and having to put it down put me in a bad mood. It's a book to savor for its splendid characters, dead-on dialogue, cinemascope descriptions of place and atmosphere, and driving plot. It's the kind of unbelieveable story that becomes completely believeable in the expert telling. I couldn't predict where I was being taken, like being driven through the Winding Stair Mountains in heavy fog, and I was thankful that a writer with unerring skill was at the wheel. Speer Morgan has an unfailing and incredible sense of historical accuracy. I was completely convinced that these characters were real. In addition to the pleasures of pure storytelling and exotic place, Freshour provided an even deeper satisfaction. It's such a powerful and harrowing book about the past: about the way our cultural past affects us collectively and the way we are each affected by our individual past. Tom Freshour, being half white, half Indian, is such a good character for this unfolding. And what a stunning indictment of white greed and American justice!

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars One Really! Good Book., June 23, 1999

By 

James P. Dunne Boggs ([e-mail]) (Missoula, Montana) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Freshour Cylinders (Hardcover)

This book is entertaining, well-written, informative, well-plotted, sexy, and with an intrigueing cast of characters. As an anthropologist who once lived in Oklahoma, I appreciate how well it captures both the ethos of the area, and the issues of contemporary cultural interactions and archaeology that it deals with. In addition to all this, one of the best things about The Freshour Cylinders is the author's gentle and perceptive portrayals of human, especially male/female, interaction. It is rare to find a book that is so enjoyable on so many levels. It's fun to share a good thing: I want this book to be read.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Oklahoma native says book captures the flavor of the region, February 14, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: The Freshour Cylinders (Hardcover)

The Freshour Cylinders by Speer Morgan is an exciting and authentic picture of western Arkansas and eastern Oklahoma in the thirties. It combines authentic information about the famous Spiro Indian Mounds with a suspenseful story about murder, love, and the Native American experience in "Indian Territory." It is as gripping a thriller as you'll find on the shelves, and it has the added attraction of believable characters and an unusually keen sense of place and time.