What do you think?
Rate this book
John Ray Horn #2
While I Disappear
Former actor John Ray Horn tracks down his former leading lady, faded beauty Rose Galen, only to find her strangled to death, and embarks on a dangerous investigation into her murder that takes him into the dark underbelly of Hollywood's silent-film era. Reprint.
368 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published May 24, 2004
2 people are currently reading
47 people want to read
About the author
Edward Wright
91 books13 followers Ed Wright grew up in Arkansas, where his father sold hardware and his mother raised three children and taught arts and crafts. He has degrees from Vanderbilt University (honors, English literature) and Northwestern University (master’s, journalism). He was an officer in the U.S. Navy aboard destroyers for three years. His first major career was journalism, and he worked as an editor at the Chicago Tribune and Los Angeles Times.
At the Times, he specialized for several years in Middle East affairs and later was one of the senior editors on the foreign desk, helping supervise the work of three dozen foreign correspondents around the world and plan coverage of events ranging from the fall of the Soviet Union to the first Persian Gulf War. He later wrote the Times’ Travel Advisory column.
Ed's second career, fiction writing, led to the John Ray Horn mysteries, set in Los Angeles during the 1940s. The series has won four awards, including the Shamus Award and Britain’s Ellis Peters Historical Crime Award. He departed from the series with his next book, “Damnation Falls,” a contemporary mystery set in small-town Tennessee, which won the Barry Award. His most recent, the thriller "From Blood," was named one of the best mysteries of 2010 by the Financial Times of London.
Ed and his wife, Cathy, a psychotherapist, live in the Los Angeles area with Magic, an irrepressible female Belgian shepherd mix. At least once a year the three of them head off to the lakes and trails of the eastern Sierra Nevada.
Photo by Jennifer Leshnick
At the Times, he specialized for several years in Middle East affairs and later was one of the senior editors on the foreign desk, helping supervise the work of three dozen foreign correspondents around the world and plan coverage of events ranging from the fall of the Soviet Union to the first Persian Gulf War. He later wrote the Times’ Travel Advisory column.
Ed's second career, fiction writing, led to the John Ray Horn mysteries, set in Los Angeles during the 1940s. The series has won four awards, including the Shamus Award and Britain’s Ellis Peters Historical Crime Award. He departed from the series with his next book, “Damnation Falls,” a contemporary mystery set in small-town Tennessee, which won the Barry Award. His most recent, the thriller "From Blood," was named one of the best mysteries of 2010 by the Financial Times of London.
Ed and his wife, Cathy, a psychotherapist, live in the Los Angeles area with Magic, an irrepressible female Belgian shepherd mix. At least once a year the three of them head off to the lakes and trails of the eastern Sierra Nevada.
Photo by Jennifer Leshnick
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 14 of 14 reviews
August 27, 2007
WHILE I DISAPPEAR (Amateur Sleuth-California-1950s) – VG
Wright, Edward – 2nd in series
Putnam, 2004- Hardcover
John Ray Horn is a former movie cowboy who now collects gambling debts for his former Indian co-star, Joseph Mad Crow. When John and Joseph visit a bar to persuade a man again bothering Joe's niece, John sees a woman, Rose Galen, who had starred in a movie with him years before. John finds she has fallen on hard time, renews his acquaintance, and learns she is carrying guilt for an incident that lead to a woman's death. When he finds Rose dead, John is determined to uncover the secret and find her killer.
*** Wright has created a wonderful, atmospheric series with an interesting protagonist. Horn definitely has a past for which he is still paying. He is also very human, feeling guilt for his own past, knowing he is not the hero cowboy, and often leaping to the wrong conclusion. But he also has that sense of right that keeps driving him forward. The books are well plotted and the supporting characters are as interesting as John. Wright puts the reader in post WII Los Angeles when the studio system was still in existence, everyone smoked and men wore hats. I have very much enjoyed both books in this series and look forward to reading the next.
Wright, Edward – 2nd in series
Putnam, 2004- Hardcover
John Ray Horn is a former movie cowboy who now collects gambling debts for his former Indian co-star, Joseph Mad Crow. When John and Joseph visit a bar to persuade a man again bothering Joe's niece, John sees a woman, Rose Galen, who had starred in a movie with him years before. John finds she has fallen on hard time, renews his acquaintance, and learns she is carrying guilt for an incident that lead to a woman's death. When he finds Rose dead, John is determined to uncover the secret and find her killer.
*** Wright has created a wonderful, atmospheric series with an interesting protagonist. Horn definitely has a past for which he is still paying. He is also very human, feeling guilt for his own past, knowing he is not the hero cowboy, and often leaping to the wrong conclusion. But he also has that sense of right that keeps driving him forward. The books are well plotted and the supporting characters are as interesting as John. Wright puts the reader in post WII Los Angeles when the studio system was still in existence, everyone smoked and men wore hats. I have very much enjoyed both books in this series and look forward to reading the next.
May 20, 2024
I liked this book. What I didn’t realize when I picked it up was that it is number 2 in a series. There were several cryptic references to what happened in the previous book, but aside from just being a little annoying, they did not take away from this story. I liked John Ray Horn and his friend, Joseph Mad Crow. Some of the content involves a violent, ugly crime, just heads up for those who need to know.
March 6, 2025
3/10
Not only did it fail to build on the first, it actually got a lot more boring. It feels like all the non important stuff went from 30% of the book to like 80%. And then the 20% of the book that's feels important or interesting unfortunately just isn't done well. The mystery is not very good. The characters are not compelling. The biggest saving grace is the setting and the main character, which are just inherently interesting. I probably won't read the 3rd.
Not only did it fail to build on the first, it actually got a lot more boring. It feels like all the non important stuff went from 30% of the book to like 80%. And then the 20% of the book that's feels important or interesting unfortunately just isn't done well. The mystery is not very good. The characters are not compelling. The biggest saving grace is the setting and the main character, which are just inherently interesting. I probably won't read the 3rd.
August 18, 2019
Tearjerker. A novel with a heart. Love it!
September 29, 2019
John Ray on
ce again - RIP Edward Wright.
ce again - RIP Edward Wright.
May 31, 2020
Keeping up my quarantine reading (only a weekend behind) and with the weather turning, it was perfect for this easy going crime noir which had just enough bite and plot to keep going.
January 2, 2008
Definitely not something I would normally read, except I got it via Bookcrossing and once I started it, had to finish it even though it took much longer than it normally would have taken me because I couldn’t get into it.
A disgraced former movie cowboy and ex-con, Horn walks the mean streets of post-WWII Los Angeles in search of the brutal killer who snuffed out the life of Rose Galen, a faded leading lady who co-starred in one of Horn’s films. A shameful secret from the victim’s past forces Horn to challenge the official theory of the crime-that the killing was a random act. Aided by his current boss (and former faithful movie sidekick) Joseph Mad Crow, Horn pounds the pavement and reaches out to old friends to identify the source of Galen’s guilty conscience. Wright does a superb job of integrating a fair-play whodunit plot into a hard-boiled setting rife with personal and official corruption. He also manages to invest bit players-such as a lonely old fellow boarder of Galen’s at the down-and-out hotel where she died-with humanity and dignity that provide a striking and dramatic counterpoint to the warped inner lives of some Hollywood notables
A disgraced former movie cowboy and ex-con, Horn walks the mean streets of post-WWII Los Angeles in search of the brutal killer who snuffed out the life of Rose Galen, a faded leading lady who co-starred in one of Horn’s films. A shameful secret from the victim’s past forces Horn to challenge the official theory of the crime-that the killing was a random act. Aided by his current boss (and former faithful movie sidekick) Joseph Mad Crow, Horn pounds the pavement and reaches out to old friends to identify the source of Galen’s guilty conscience. Wright does a superb job of integrating a fair-play whodunit plot into a hard-boiled setting rife with personal and official corruption. He also manages to invest bit players-such as a lonely old fellow boarder of Galen’s at the down-and-out hotel where she died-with humanity and dignity that provide a striking and dramatic counterpoint to the warped inner lives of some Hollywood notables
June 1, 2015
This is "While I Disappear" under a different title. That being said, it is an excellent entry in an intriguing series.
Blacklisted from Hollywood for beating up a studio exec, former B-movie western star John Ray Horn can't quite shake his movieland roots. The past resurfaces in the form of Horn's onetime leading lady, Rose Galen, who has fallen on hard times herself. Horn hopes to help her back on her feet, but before he has a chance, she is strangled in her bed. A shameful secret from the victim's past forces Horn to challenge the official theory of the crime, that the killing was a random act.
Blacklisted from Hollywood for beating up a studio exec, former B-movie western star John Ray Horn can't quite shake his movieland roots. The past resurfaces in the form of Horn's onetime leading lady, Rose Galen, who has fallen on hard times herself. Horn hopes to help her back on her feet, but before he has a chance, she is strangled in her bed. A shameful secret from the victim's past forces Horn to challenge the official theory of the crime, that the killing was a random act.
August 9, 2015
I'd enjoyed the first novel, 'Clea's moon' much more than this one, his second outing. The plot took too long to develop, a retired Hollywood cowboy as protagonist was interesting at first and had possibilities, but then failed to develop into an interesting personality. I'd hoped for some tension, some suspense, a tumble or two and yet, after 100 pages, I found myself becoming disinterested, even though his first leading lady had disappeared as promised, and then it lost any appeal. Sorry Mr. Wright.
June 1, 2015
Blacklisted from Hollywood for beating up a studio exec, former B-movie western star John Ray Horn can't quite shake his movieland roots. The past resurfaces in the form of Horn's onetime leading lady, Rose Galen, who has fallen on hard times herself. Horn hopes to help her back on her feet, but before he has a chance, she is strangled in her bed. A shameful secret from the victim's past forces Horn to challenge the official theory of the crime, that the killing was a random act.
April 14, 2012
This book won the Shamus award. I really enjoyed this book. I liked it that Horn has to solve an old Hollywood crime to solve the present crime. Great descriptions of the different worlds of Hollywood.
November 9, 2010
Setting (1950s LA) and characters (many actors or involved in the movie industry) are interesting, but some dialogue seemed stilted and some plot points seems contrived.
Want to read
January 30, 2019Synopsis: the ex-movie cowboy and conman, John Ray Horn, searches for the killer of his former co-star.
June 28, 2019
Evocative.
Displaying 1 - 14 of 14 reviews