I wrote the following as a From The Author for the first book in the Ed Earl Burch hard-boiled Texas crime thriller series, The Last Second Chance. He’s evolved ever so slightly since then — older, meaner, less tolerant of fools and dirtbags. I also think he’s a lot smarter than I gave him credit for being. Not brilliant, certainly not a genius. Rather, he’s savvy, tough and very street smart.

But here’s what I had in mind when the salty rascal first popped up on my computer screen…

When I started thinking about my main character, Ed Earl Burch, I wanted him to be strong, flawed, reckless, cagey, cynical and utterly human, a guy who has a code he sometimes forgets to live by but returns to under pressure. I didn’t want him to be a Spade or a Marlowe — I wanted him to be more angst-ridden and tortured than those guys.

Ed Earl’s a little slow on the uptake, but not dumb. He’s dogged rather than brilliant. And he sure isn’t supercool like Frank Bullitt — he’s the polar opposite of that. He’s Columbo without the caricature — people he goes up against underestimate him and he makes them pay for that mistake.

What I wound up with in the telling of this story is a guy with whom I think most people can identify. Ed Earl’s a bit of an Everyman who’s been smacked around by life. As a result, he’s placed himself in a box of his own making — one he thinks will keep him from getting smacked again. You meet him as a cashiered Dallas homicide detective, eking out a living as a PI who chases the financial fugitives of the oil and real estate bust and savings-and-loan collapse that scarred Texas in the mid-to-late 80s.

He’s got his life narrowed down to the shabby essentials — a ratty apartment, a hole-in-the-wall office and bourbon in his favorite bar, which happens to be my all-time favorite bar, Louie’s in Dallas. Play it smart and cautious. Keep the lines straight. Don’t take a risk. Don’t give a damn. It’s the creed of the terminal burnout and he’s living it a day at a time, drink by drink.

He’s dead wrong about all this keeping him safe from more pain. He’s also his own worst enemy — a cynical smartass who can’t help taking a whack at folks he doesn’t like even when he knows they’ll whack him back.

When the action of the story tears him away from his safe haven, he’s surprised to find the grit and determination that made him a good cop are still there, giving him the strength to answer the call. He starts out wanting revenge — for himself and his murdered best friend. But what he finds is a battered form of redemption.

A friend calls Ed Earl a classic American anti-hero. I’ll buy that.

So, tell me what you think of Ed Earl and his hard-boiled evolution. Post a comment.

And it you want a copy of the book that started it all, go to: https://www.amazon.com/Last-Second-Chance-Burch-Novel/dp/1519243065