STILL RIVER

A gunfest debut for Vietnam vet Lee Henry Oswald, now a Dallas shamus.

The police think rehabbed Charlie Wesson died of an overdose, but that two-fisted beer drinker Hank Oswald lets Charlie’s sister Vera Drinkwater talk him into looking for his killer. Hank relies on the help of three veterans with a stockpile of weaponry: Delmar, Olson and Nolan O’Connor, the psychobabbling niece of Ernie, Hank’s cancer-stricken partner. As the three climb into one used car after another, guns handy on the seats next to them, they’re tailed, then blasted with enough firepower to sweep the Mekong Delta clean. Dead bodies litter the Dallas streets. Some are recognizable as assorted Dallas players like the Big Man himself, Fagen Strathmore; Aaron Young, from the south side of town; Coleman Dupree, the half-brother of Someone Big; and Jack the Crack, who wonders what happened to the 30 pounds of cocaine in Wesson’s crib. Bang go the guns. Vroom go the car chases. Hank loses his partner to the Big C and almost loses Nolan to Jack the Crack. A billion-dollar real estate deal surfaces, along with some unexpected next-of-kin.

Reads like a flyer for the NRA, with all the good sniping spots in Dallas pinpointed. Name a genre cliché—the loner and his unlovely dog, gals in thong bikinis, too much booze, enough bruises to hospitalize Bruce Willis—and it’s here.