SELDOM DISAPPOINTED: A MEMOIR; by Tony Hillerman; HarperCollins, 341 pages; $26.
Any memoir that is both whimsical and self-effacing usually makes interesting reading. "Seldom Disappointed," by the prolific mystery writer Tony Hillerman, happily qualifies on both counts.
At the venerable age of 76, Hillerman looks back with the help of a razor-sharp memory, then writes with breezy, anecdotal abandon. Here is a man who has been a war hero, a journalist, a politician, an academic — and finally, a novelist with a large and devoted following.
Unlike most new novelists, Hillerman had amassed considerable wisdom by the time he wrote his first book — and it showed. Now the author of 35 books, his work is published in 16 languages.
Opposite to so many men who feel compelled to invent a heroic war record out of nothing, Hillerman was a genuine hero during World War II, going home with the Silver Star and the Bronze Star but without sight in one eye and serious damage to his foot. He was decorated for "action on a daylight recon patrol on 29 November 1944," but he claims to have been "only a tagalong," and he is astounded that none of the others in his crew got a medal, including "Huckins, the only one of us except for the sergeant who actually did anything."
As for himself? "Why me? Who knows? Maybe names are drawn from a colonel's hat."
An Oklahoma boy who witnessed a Navajo curing ceremony during the war and was changed forever, Hillerman became fascinated by the subject of American Indians. Even when his first novel was criticized by a respected editor, who gave him the terse advice — "Get rid of that Indian stuff" — Hillerman persisted and became a pioneer.
A diffident college student in Oklahoma, Hillerman achieved only "the gentleman's C," but he loved the practice of journalism. He also met a "slender, young woman with enchanting eyes." He tapped her dancing partner on the shoulder and asked if he could cut in.
He had met Marie Elizabeth Unzner, the love of his life. They married, had one child and adopted five more, turning Hillerman into a genuine family man. It was with Marie's encouragement that he finally gave up journalism after 15 years to write novels.
Hillerman says, "Writers' minds are a jumbled, chaotic attic cluttered with plot notions, useful characters, settings for events, bits and pieces of information, overheard remarks, ironies, cloud formations, bumper-sticker slogans unresolved problems, bon mots, tragedies, heroics, etc. One's memory contains enough stuff to produce three or four longer versions of "War and Peace," if only one could sort it out and form it into a coherent fable."
Through hard work, Hillerman became an expert on the Navajo. But his first book, "The Blessing Way," a mystery set on the Navajo reservation, was a disappointment to him. Still, it made him a full-fledged author, and he was on his way.
Over the years, he discovered that — in spite of the "political correctness" that decreed Indians be called everything from "indigenous people" to "native Americans" — Indians themselves prefer to be called "Indians."
Once Hillerman had created his most beloved character, Lt. Joe Leaphorn, a Navajo tribal policeman, he was home free. The "breakout book" that made him a national figure was "A Thief of Time," but his own favorite , "Finding Moon," is set in Vietnam. It's about Carl "Moon" Mathias, a rifle-squad leader. Says Hillerman: "It's the closest I have come to writing a book that satisfied me."
The best part of this entertaining memoir is Hillerman's detailed explanations of each of 26 books, including the ideas and experiences, often even characters from real life, that lead to them.
E-mail: dennis@desnews.com