R.I.P, David Thompson Of Murder By The Book

​For avid fans of the murder mystery genre, you’d think death was commonplace. But not when it snatches away one of our own.

So we loyal patrons of Murder by the Book, Houston’s go-to place for all things murder and mystery, are devastated to learn of David Thompson’s sudden passing yesterday. David, a Murder by the Book fixture for 21 years, seemed to know the guts of every book, and had an infallible sense of connecting customers to their Holy Mystery Grail.

David met his wife, McKenna Jordan, while both were employees. Along the way, she bought the bookstore, and he founded a mystery publishing company, Busted Flush Press, which features both aspiring writers and established notables such as Reed Farrell Coleman.

Last month, David’s publishing company merged with another independent Tyrus Books Inc. of Madison, Wisconsin.

But
even though David certainly had a dog in the hunt when it came to books
to tout, he was just as familiar with books he did not publish — many
of them gems I might not have ever uncovered.

David was like the
best of coaches; he steered you in the direction of your dream novel,
matching you up with the author sure to please you. Sure, you can find
your Lescroarts and your Graftons and your Christies, but to learn about
Ian Sansom or — long before the major motion picture is released, Winter’s Bone, by Daniel Woodrell?

I once confessed to enjoying
former news reporter Kathy Hogan Trocheck, so he steered me to her
second series under another nom de plume, Mary Kay Andrews. When I found
her a bit too silly, he turned me on to the decadently delicious Kick
Keswick, the heroine of a series by Marne Davis Kellogg.  

People
play, “Defend what’s on your iPod,” but with David at the helm, I
could always defend the reading in my beach bag. And his finest referral
occurred only a few weeks ago, when he urged me to try an unknown-to-me
author from Belfast, Colin Bateman, stressing that I would find it
hilarious. (Comedy’s got to be mixed in with almost everything for me.)
Did David know his stuff? Absolutement – I hustled back in to the
bookstore to get the next one, minutes after finishing Bateman’s Mystery Man, a series about a bookstore owner who gets suckered into
solving local mysteries when the next-door neighbor, a private
detective, meets an untimely end.

The next book in the series was
a definite winner, as well.  As I read the series set in Belfast, I
found myself drawing parallels to David himself, although the series’
hero never met anyone or anything he couldn’t turn into an antagonist.
He attributes his successes to what he’s learned from a multitude of
mysteries — and names the classics for those who grew up on, say,
Michael Crichton.

Bateman, the author, is like
his main character a proponent for good mystery writing and the independent
bookstore owner, and rails against the megachains in a most
sarcastically delicious way. No McMystery advocacy here! With every
rant, I found myself silently tipping my deerstalker (i.e., a hat like
Sherlock Holmes wore) to David and his wife.

A bookstore employee said a “celebration of life” memorial is planned within the next week or two.

Thank
you for your years of thoughtful service, David. You leave a void in
the industry, and in the community. Rest easy, my friend, and may you
finally unravel all the mysteries of life — and beyond.
 

This article appears in Sep 9-15, 2010.