By the time his first novel appeared, Gault had served a long apprenticeship in the pulp magazines, beginning with sports stories before branching out into mysteries. The action of the Edgar-winning Don’t Cry for Me (1952) takes place around Christmas 1950 in Southern California. First-person hero Pete Worden is the playboy black sheep of a wealthy family, a former USC quarterback whose relationship with intellectual beauty Ellen Gallegher is a typical male-female pairing in Gault’s world.

When Pete decks one of suave gangster Nick Arnold’s more dangerous party guests, the thoughtful host provides Pete with a bodyguard, an offbeat character who left the Communist Party because you have to change your mind too much. The angry guest turns up dead in Pete’s apartment with steak knife in his throat, making Pete the major suspect. Apart from the murder investigation, Pete has a major ethical conflict: will he or won’t he accept a job offer from Arnold?