Patrick F. McManus - Recurring Elements

Recurring Elements

McManus' shorter works include a recurring cast of fictitious characters and running jokes, both from the stories set in his childhood and as an adult. The foremost among the childhood stories is his "mentor" Rancid Crabtree, a colorful woodsman who lives near Pat's childhood home, who hasn't bathed because of his fear of getting wet. Other recurring characters are his childhood best friend, 'Crazy Eddie' Muldoon, and his adulthood friends, the goofy and dim-witted Retch Sweeney and his straitlaced neighbor, Alphonse 'Al' Finley. Throughout the majority of the stories is a recurring theme of McManus's lifelong love of hunting and fishing—which is mostly an excuse to just enjoy the outdoors, often in good company. Most of his friends likewise enjoy hunting and fishing, even if they aren't particularly good at it. McManus, in his stories, has a certain amount of disgruntlement for people who take great pleasure in the minutiae of various sports (such as encyclopediac knowledge of firearms calibers and ballistics). He refers to firearms enthusiastics as 'gun nuts' and treats their excited sharing of the fine points of ballistic arcs and grain sizes as something to be endured to get on a good hunting trip.

Some of the elements show up in his longer works, and are even worked into the plots. Bo Tully, the protagonist of the Bo Tully Mysteries, shares McManus' views about firearms—in the course of his job as Sheriff and his hobbies, Tully uses guns, knows about guns, but isn't particularly excited by them or even sentimental towards them. He is, however, aware that many people are. This even serves as plot point in one of the Bo Tully mysteries, Tully is investigating an absent murder suspect and sees that the man has a gorgeously mounted collection of antique, original, or unusual firearms—with a gap in it that would correspond to the type of handgun used in a murder. Tully realized it's likely that an ardent gun collector would be reluctant to destroy or permanently discard such a gun, and operates on the hunch that the murder weapon is hidden nearby and carefully preserved to prevent possible damage.