As we roll towards Christmas 2023, I thought for this Short Story Wednesday I would offer you a seasonal repeat. It seemed fitting.
Back a number of years ago, I first heard about
The Empty Manager by Bill Crider when Ben Boulden mentioned his 2008 review of
the same over on his Gravetapping Blog. It wasn’t available via eBook or at my
local library so Bill Crider sent me a copy from his own personal library. I
reviewed it here on the blog late December 2014. I mentioned in here again in
December 2016 and again in 2019. I had planned to read the other novellas in
the book and still have not managed to do that. Life tended to laugh and interfere
with my plans on this and quite a number of other things. So it goes. Though I
have not managed to get the job done, my advice remains the same as it was
then—if you can get your hands on the book, do so.
Sheriff Dan Rhodes can’t remember it ever snowing
in Blacklin County on Christmas. It certainly didn’t look like it would happen
this year with daytime temperatures in the upper 60’s and low 40’s at night.
Typical weather for the area residents of the county located in East Texas, but
not conducive to the postcard winter wonderland so many long for at this time
of year.
Like a lot of small Texan towns-- and elsewhere
for that matter-- the downtown area of Clearview has a number of vacant
buildings in various states of disrepair. Some of the vacant buildings are in
very bad shape. Shoppers were drawn away to the nearby Wal-Mart or one of the
big new grocery stores and local businesses closed leaving the buildings to
decay and rot. City council member Jerri Laxton had been pushing plans to
restore the grandeur of the downtown area.
One of her ideas was to get some of the local
high school students to paint a mural on one of the walls of a downtown
building. Some of the local religious leaders convinced all that in the spirit
of the season the mural should be of a manger with a brilliant star hanging
over it. Somebody else came up with the plan to have members of the local
Baptist congregation play the parts of Joseph, Mary, wise men, and the
shepherds with a doll standing in for the baby Jesus. After all, the risk with
a real baby as part of the outside scene would be too high.
It was a very good thing that a doll was used
because, according to Francis Blair, somebody stole baby Jesus. She is very
upset that somebody would do that. She might be more upset if she knew there
was a dead body in the alley behind the building.
While Rhodes never drinks a Dr Pepper----though he does talk about it---- and he never eats any crackers, he does actively work the cases. Any Rhodes story is a good one and this one is no exception. The novella, The Empty Manger by Bill Crider is well worth the effort to get your hands on the book, Murder, Mayhem, And Mistletoe. Crider’s story is one of four novellas in the book that also contains works from Terence Faherty, Aileen Schumacher, and Wendi Lee.
Material supplied by the author so that I could
read and review.
Kevin R. Tipple ©2014, 2016, 2019, 2023
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