David Thompson, 1971-2010

I heard the news this morning and thought it was a joke. Or some other David Thompson. I clicked through and saw that it was real. David was really gone.

I'm finding it difficult to write this, because I'm experiencing a surge of emotion that doesn't seem to want to be confined to words. So many memories; so much love for him. I'm sitting in my basement office, the same room where David stayed when he was here in Philly for the first NoirCon in 2007. I remember him talking about cars with my son Parker. Watching a goofy children's show with my daughter Sarah, making jokes in that wonderful, slow-motion Texas accent of his. (Sometimes I felt like we were the same record player, only set on different speeds: me on 78, David on 33.) I remember David reading an arc of Scott Sigler's Infected while he was here... see, I always paid close attention to what David was reading or recommending, because his recommendations were pure gold.

I remember taking the above photo at NoirCon -- the gag, of course, being the menopause reference, because we'd collaborated on Damn Near Dead (one of his first titles at Busted Flush Press). For a while there, we were the kings of a very specific sub-subgenre of mystery fiction: hardboiled geezer.

I remember the half-dozen times I stayed with David and McKenna at their place in Houston, and how they treated me like family, staying up late talking books and drinking beer and generally being silly.

I remember driving with David across scorching Texas, road tripping from Houston to Austin so that we could be at ConMisterio to promote Damn Near Dead, happily talking books and writers the whole way.

I remember the first time I spoke to David on the phone, thinking he was a 50-year-old man... why, he had to be, to treat an absolute nobody with such generosity and enthusiasm, inviting me to do a signing with the big boys (Ken Bruen, Jason Starr, Allan Guthrie, J.D. Rhoades). It was my first appearance as a novelist; nothing will ever top it.

I remember the 7th (or 8th?) beer we were knocking back later that night when David first pitched me his idea for Damn Near Dead.

I remember thinking: This guy must be crazy. I'm nobody! And he wants me to edit an anthology for him?

I remember all of this and more about David, and I'm heartbroken that I won't be hearing his voice again, or talking books with him again.

But the thing I remember most, right now, at this very moment...

I was on a panel last fall at Bouchercon in Indianapolis. At one point, I joked about Twittering a photo of the audience, and snapped one on my cell phone. The photo is below. Right there in the front row, in the middle, wearing his trademark untucked shirt and jeans, arms folded, is my friend David. Beaming. Laughing at our stupid jokes. Proud of all of us.