He does! He says "my parents both died when I was a kid" in Fer-de-Lance.
But, later on in one of the books, and now I forget which one, they're trying to convince some client to go against the wishes of a parent, and Archie tells this long inspirational story, like, "Yeah, I hated my mom, she was so mean and bossy, and when I turned eighteen I just told her to go to hell and lived my own life! And we never spoke to each other again, but I did what I thought was right!" and the client is like "YEAH! Right on!" and is manipulated into doing what Wolfe and Archie want.
And then after the guy leaves Wolfe is like ".....that's interesting because when your mom came to visit that one time you seemed very close. How is your mom?" and Archie is like "Mom is fine... oh, she says hi by the way."
So there's a couple ways to interpret that--
1) it's true, Archie's mom is alive, and Archie was lying in "Fer-de-Lance," possibly in an attempt to protect his mom from unwanted publicity.
2) Archie's parents both died as a kid and when Wolfe says Archie's "mother" came to visit he means an aunt or someone who took him in after his folks died, who Archie maybe *calls* "mom", and she really is a nice lady who visits him sometimes and says "tell Wolfe hi!" in her letters.
3) Archie's parents both died as a kid and his story about being raised by a mean, controlling person is true, and he *did* tell that person to go to hell and take off, but then when he's writing down the report of that case he throws in the "....but not really, I love my mom" epilogue in order to not give the wrong idea to impressionable young people who in most cases really shouldn't tell their parents to go to hell.
4) *Both* sides of the story are bunk, there was no "Go to hell, caregiver!" scene in Archie's past and there was no nice lady who came to visit them, the whole thing was just made up to persuade the client, etc. Archie was raised by coyotes in the Chillicothe prairie!
Etc., etc., etc. In short I don't take any one thing as particularly definitive. *G*
no subject
But, later on in one of the books, and now I forget which one, they're trying to convince some client to go against the wishes of a parent, and Archie tells this long inspirational story, like, "Yeah, I hated my mom, she was so mean and bossy, and when I turned eighteen I just told her to go to hell and lived my own life! And we never spoke to each other again, but I did what I thought was right!" and the client is like "YEAH! Right on!" and is manipulated into doing what Wolfe and Archie want.
And then after the guy leaves Wolfe is like ".....that's interesting because when your mom came to visit that one time you seemed very close. How is your mom?" and Archie is like "Mom is fine... oh, she says hi by the way."
So there's a couple ways to interpret that--
1) it's true, Archie's mom is alive, and Archie was lying in "Fer-de-Lance," possibly in an attempt to protect his mom from unwanted publicity.
2) Archie's parents both died as a kid and when Wolfe says Archie's "mother" came to visit he means an aunt or someone who took him in after his folks died, who Archie maybe *calls* "mom", and she really is a nice lady who visits him sometimes and says "tell Wolfe hi!" in her letters.
3) Archie's parents both died as a kid and his story about being raised by a mean, controlling person is true, and he *did* tell that person to go to hell and take off, but then when he's writing down the report of that case he throws in the "....but not really, I love my mom" epilogue in order to not give the wrong idea to impressionable young people who in most cases really shouldn't tell their parents to go to hell.
4) *Both* sides of the story are bunk, there was no "Go to hell, caregiver!" scene in Archie's past and there was no nice lady who came to visit them, the whole thing was just made up to persuade the client, etc. Archie was raised by coyotes in the Chillicothe prairie!
Etc., etc., etc. In short I don't take any one thing as particularly definitive. *G*