In a case of coincidental plot devices, two of Texas’s favorite fictional gumshoes recently swore off the detecting business because of an unfortunate tendency to call down death on their nearest and dearest. But quitting the private-eye racket is easier said than done, and the summer reading pile finds both Harry Hunsicker’s Lee Henry Oswald and Rick Riordan’s Tres Navarre sucked back into the life. In Crosshairs (Thomas Dunne, $23.95), Dallasite Oswald must protect a research doctor with a stalker problem; along the way, he befriends some colorful Irish travelers (rovers, not tourists) and goes mano a mano with the Professor, a shadowy figure who leaves a trail of corpses in his wake. Meanwhile, on the Gulf Coast, Navarre and his pregnant new bride, Maia, get trapped on Rebel Island (Bantam, $25) during their honeymoon while a hurricane and a killer wreak havoc on their resort hotel. Navarre tries his damnedest to keep the body count in the single digits while the storm blows itself out.
