Mortal Lock by Andrew Vachss (collection of 20 short stories and a screenplay)

Crime author Andrew Vachss is well known as a modern master of the hardboiled tale, and the twenty-one works in his latest collection, Mortal Lock, only serve to further that reputation.

Vachss is an attorney who only represents clients under 18, but his doppelganger shows up in "Veil's Visit" (co-written with friend and fellow Texan Joe R. Lansdale) to defend Hap Collins's best friend, serial crack-house arsonist Leonard Pine.

Veil's defense is as funny as it is clever, and Lansdale and Vachss blend their styles seamlessly. It is a treat for Lansdale fans and a welcome source of laughs in the midst of the surrounding darkness.

Because the stories in Mortal Lock are dark, no doubt about it. Vachss seems to specialize in portraying the worst sides of humanity, with only occasional dashes of hope included.

Lucky for the reader, what makes society poorer makes for gripping fiction. From beginning to end, the works in Mortal Lock — I would say "stories," but the final third is devoted to a screenplay adapting the "Underground" stories from Born Bad — are utterly engrossing.

And the characters are originals. Take the narrator of "Ghostwriter," one of two previously unpublished stories. He will do anything to be recognized for his writing, as long as it's for its quality. He doesn't care about the money; he still needs to realize his true ambition, no matter who gets in the way.

"Bloodlines" (source of the title phrase) is the other original in Mortal Lock. To fit in while he waits for his target to come along, a hit man learns the ins and outs of racing "trotters." The story and dialogue were reminiscent of some of the best work of Damon Runyon (a favorite of mine), and I loved learning about an unfamiliar topic while being entertained by two really great characters.

Other memorable characters that come to mind are the cagey old prisoner from "Seeding the Ground," and Rhino and Princess from "Profile" — which features series character Cross, protagonist of Blackjack and numerous short stories. "As the Crow Flies" stars the protagonists of Vachss's latest series, beginning with the novel Aftershock. The story starts out relatively low key, but that allows the ending to hit that much harder.

The writing in Mortal Lock, while it may seem sensational on the surface, is actually quite subtle. This comes out best in the several short-shorts scattered throughout. There are stories like "They're All Alike," "Corazón," "Savior," and "Dead Reliable" that save their gut punch to the end. And tales like "Sure Thing," "Passage to Paradise, and "Pig" may not deliver their full effect until the reader has left them for a while. Their power comes from what is not on the page, but in the final picture those words create in the mind.

One Night Stands and Lost Weekends: Early Stories by Lawrence Block (short stories and novellas)

May you, Dear Reader, like the tomcat who had the affair with the skunk, enjoy these stories as much as you can stand.

—Lawrence Block, from the introduction

In 1999, publisher Crippen & Landru released limited hardcover editions of the early short fiction of author Lawrence Block.  The short-story volume was entitled One Night Stands, and the novella collection was called The Lost Cases of Ed London.

Now, these two volumes have been combined into a single trade paperback with the provocative title One Night Stands and Lost Weekends. The title describes the average time it took to write the short stories and novellas, respectively.

Block begins One Night Stands and Lost Weekends with a self-deprecatingly humorous introduction where he tells why he changed his mind regarding his original decision — set down in the introduction (also included) to the preceding limited collectors' edition — to only release the stories to a limited audience. Basically that, upon reading the stories, no one called "rip off," so why not make a little more money off them?

While these stories obviously aren't to the level of Block's later work (a point he emphasizes in both introductions, practically going so far as to warn the reader away from them), they will still appeal to the author's fans.  His voice is already clear, and the humor and imagination glosses over any imperfections in craft.

Con man Dick Barron runs across an amateur playing "The Badger Game" — badly — and decides to go along with it and turn the tables, though he's a little too arrogant for his own good. Before reading this story, I had not heard of this con, and now references to it seem to keep popping up. Apparently it was a popular plot device during the period. The story is definitely of its time — the narrator speaks of "expensive" thirty-dollar shoes — but Block's skill at character makes this one of special appeal to fans of confidence tales like his The Girl with the Long Green Heart.

"The Bad Night" is a simple and unsurprising standoff between two young killers and their much older potential victim. The use of setting and dialogue goes a long way toward saving this one. "Bargain in Blood," originally published under the "Sheldon Lord" byline, has a simple message: the next time your other half wants you to prove your love, just hope she's not Rita. Block manages to put off the surprise nearly to the end here.

"Bride of Violence" is a very well executed piece of pure crime fiction with a twist that, if hard to condone, is completely the result of the actions of the story. "The Burning Fury" is another one of those stories of people who can't leave well enough alone.  Block's characterization is stunning, giving all the right information and still holding back a surprise.

Characterization is everything in "The Dope," since there's very little in the way of plot.  "A Fire in the Night" is an internal monologue of sorts with a twist that negates several factual statements from the story.  "Frozen Stiff" owes a debt to Roald Dahl, as the irony flows. (A nod to the master is given in the form of a leg of lamb.)  Another Sheldon Lord, "Just Window Shopping," shows remarkable insight into the mind of a voyeur who gets a surprise opportunity.

A quote usually misattributed to Confucius says that if rape is inevitable, just "Lie Back and Enjoy It." But then the tables are turned a little too cutely in this tale from 1958. (Read it online.)  "Look Death in the Eye" is reminiscent of Robert Bloch with its darkly funny and humorously gruesome Tales from the Crypt–style ending.  In "Man of Passion," a photographer on the run picks the wrong town to hide out in.

"Nor Iron Bars a Cage" is one of those tales where you just know there's going to be a twist that the whole story was conceived around, but still Block manages to surprise with his only attempt at science fiction. "Package Deal" concerns town tamer Lou Baron, Joe Milani, Albert Hallander, Mike Ross, Arlington Ohio, and a hit man with his own agenda.

A particular highlight is "Pseudo Identity." It is the tragic tale of a double life that goes awry when the two overlap in an unexpected way.  Block pulls us along a surprising route that ends in a karmic twist.  This is one of his best all around.

"Ride the White Horse" is a very dark tale of how one man's life changes for the better — and then for the worse — when his routine is disrupted. A little naive in its drug knowledge but very astute in drawing the primary relationship.  The overblown ending is the only real detriment.

Even after having so many twists and turns thrown at me, Block still managed to get another one right past me in "The Way to Power," a tale of a mob gunman who finally begins to think for himself.  Lenny Blake (not his real name), the protagonist of "You Can't Lose," offers advice for smart guys who don't like to work but like to stay flush with cash--as long as they're not into luxury.

The "Lost Weekends" portion contains three novellas featuring Block's first series P.I., Ed London.  The introduction to this volume is similar to the other.  In "The Naked and the Deadly," London meets his client's blackmailer, and on the way to do business the extortionist is mowed down by a Tommy gun.

Ed then fills us in on the backstory: he was hired by a secretive woman, a lawyer is looking for the woman, a cop is looking for the lawyer, and things go from there.  The novella gives London (and Block) the chance to ramble on a bit and impress us with his esoteric knowledge.

In "Stag Party Girl," the title character jumps out of a cake at a bachelor dinner and gets shot for her trouble. She'd been intimate with most of the attendees and was potentially blackmailing one or more.  This is an improvement on "The Naked and the Deadly," with London seeming to take his job more seriously.

Finally, in "Twin Call Girls," Ed gets an urgent call from a frightened woman.  But when he gets to the meeting he finds her dead.  When the girl subsequently turns up alive at his office, it's not hard to figure out what's going on.  (The title gives it away.) This is the darkest of the three, with Block delving into some of the seediest aspects of humanity, but always with enough heart to make it palatable.

Reading these solid detective novelettes, it's easy to see how Block would progress to his later detective series.  And readers hungry for more Ed London can find him in Coward's Kiss.

Readers seeking classic Block should keep searching. But I heartily recommend that readers of Block's Hard Case Crime reprints get a copy of One Night Stands and Lost Weekends.

Return to Perdition by Max Allan Collins and Terry Beatty (graphic novel, Road to Perdition sequel)

With Return to Perdition, author Max Allan Collins and artist Terry Beatty conclude the saga begun by Collins and Richard Piers Rayner with Road to Perdition. It not only brings the story back to the graphic novel (sequels Road to Purgatory and Road to Paradise were prose-only novels) but also reunites Collins with Beatty in their first comic collaboration in 15 years. (Though Beatty did the cover to the Ms. Tree novel Deadly Beloved and illustrated the Jack and Maggie Starr novels, including Strip for Murder.)

While previous Perdition graphic-novel "sequels" (collected in Road to Perdition 2: On the Road) essentially expanded on the original storyline involving Michael O'Sullivan and his son, Return to Perdition picks up where Road to Paradise left off, including the illustration of a climactic scene from that book. (If you feel a little lost by not having read those books, do so; they're some of Collins's best and most personal work.)

Return to Perdition follows Michael Satariano, Jr. — spoken of but, if memory serves, never "seen" in Road to Paradise — as he is rescued from a POW camp in Laos and recruited by the Justice Department as an assassin targeted on organized crime. He trains at the FBI academy at Quantico but even more rigorously than the special agents, with a fringe benefit of his assignment being his chance to avenge his family's murder.

It's great to see Collins and Beatty together again in this form. Their classic Ms. Tree comic is terrific and influential, and their skills at their respective arts have only deepened over time. Return to Perdition is a fantastic way to end a series that I've been reading and rereading for years.

Crime Fiction and Literary Merit: the Debate (from guest blogger Anthony Garcia)

Does crime fiction have literary merit? The debate over the place of crime fiction has raged for as long as the existence of crime fiction coincided with attempts to define literature or create a literary canon. The debate has recently grown in intensity, with graduate programs in literature often discouraging students to study the genre. Crime fiction is often the center of controversy, with avid readers defending its literary merit. The fact is that this debate speaks more to the prejudices of those criticizing it than to any merits in the fiction itself.

As a genre, crime fiction encompasses a huge number of subgenres. The noir crime stories of Raymond Chandler are examples of crime fiction, as are the murder mysteries of Agatha Christie and the social commentary one can find in John Grisham’s works. In fact, the first question one has to ask is what precisely is “crime fiction”? Crime fiction can in fact cover many story styles from traditional detective fiction to police-centered and character-driven stories.

These subgenres thus make it difficult to pigeonhole crime fiction into any easy form — unlike the Western genre, for example, crime fiction cannot be restricted to a given time or place. Hard-boiled private eyes and grim noir storylines occupy the same “space” as lighthearted legal romps. Thus, trying to apply any single definition to crime fiction is an exercise in futility. This can sometimes lead people to assume that the genre as a whole has little literary merit.

It is also important for this debate to understand what the term “literary merit” means.

Literary merit includes:

• A work that is enduring rather than ephemeral. Many best sellers are forgotten a week after their first run — works with literary merit continue to be remembered long after they have been published.
• The literary classic has important commentary about, or illumination of the era it is set in. Stories with literary merit are not simply imaginary stories, but works of art that can be examined on a number of levels. For example, Little Women is a classic for the way it uses that family to tell us about the world they lived in.
• Literary classics are also written to the highest standards, involving fully realized characters and story-lines. Of course this can be very much a matter of personal choice, which demonstrates one of the problems of trying to define what has enough literary merit to become an enduring classic.

By those standards, the answer is yes, crime fiction can have literary merit. Crime fiction can be both about crime and society. The noir genre of crime fiction was not just about crime, but the cynicism and hypocrisy of society and how it often influenced the less wealthy.

Many crime fiction pieces are not simply stories about crime, but ask questions about race, class, corruption, and honesty in political and legal systems. Crime fiction has the ability to cast a critical light on our modern society.

In addition, the impact of crime fiction can be enduring. The influence of the noir, police thriller, and legal drama subgenres on public attitudes and views is easily equal to any other genre. Crime fiction set in the 1960s continues to be cited in examples of ethnic and racial attitudes from a time of often-violent flux, while modern crime fiction makes enduring statements about the place of greed in our society.

The debate about crime fiction may continue, but that should not decrease the literary merit given fiction of any genre that has the power to impact society. It may be that crime fiction's focus on the seedier side of our culture makes some reluctant to give it the recognition which it deserves, but it still deserves to be discussed and noticed. After all, any view of our society would be sadly incomplete without looking at the parts we are less than proud of, but crime fiction is nonetheless part of our shared heritage, and provides a wide selection of works with undeniable literary merit.

The Silent Wall / The Return of Marvin Palaver by Peter Rabe (also includes "Hard Case Redhead")

Though they've previously reprinted ten other novels by author Peter Rabe, this volume is exciting news even for Stark House Press as it contains two works that have never been published in any form: the novel The Silent Wall and the novella The Return of Marvin Palaver. Sandwiched between the two longer works is the ultra-rare short story "Hard Case Redhead," which has not been seen since its original appearance in Mystery Tales Magazine. All of these will be welcome additions to the libraries of Rabe enthusiasts.

Because it was the shortest, I started with "Hard Case Redhead." This story is real shot-in-the-arm fiction, with two robbers kidnapping an accidental tourist on her way across their escape alley. The tension is high, the characters well drawn, and the insight is up to usual Rabe standards — all included in a package a fraction the size of the author's usual offering.

Stark House Press's regular proofreader Rick Ollerman steps up his participation (rating a special thanks from the publisher) with an incisive, though occasionally repetitive, introduction that displays his wide knowledge of the Rabe oeuvre. Ollerman's introduction is an even better advertisement for the other Rabe books in the Stark House library than the list in the back of the book.

The Return of Marvin Palaver is quite a departure for the author, giving the reader a supernatural revenge tale that uses dialect and humor to deliver its punch. "I died at the worst possible moment in life," Marvin tells us, "just when I was coming out even."

Just when he is about to pull a masterful schwindel on his nemesis, Sidney Minsk ("may he live to be a poor man forever"), Palaver drops dead on Minsk's office floor. Unwilling to let that be the period to his life, Palaver comes back down from heaven to manipulate events toward the ultimate revenge. The Return of Marvin Palaver is sure to leave a smile on the reader's face with its perfect plotting and characterization.

Sure to be the big draw in this collection is The Silent Wall. Radio man on a tanker, "Matty" Matheson finds himself once again in Sicily, in Messina near Forza d'Aguil, where he was stationed during the War. With a week to kill before the tanker is repaired, Matty decides to revisit his past and rents a Vespa to go "see how things have turned out — for her."

For some reason he does not understand, the Mafia now don't want him to leave and have sabotaged his exit. And to make things more complicated, the only person offering assistance is an innkeeper, Vinciguerra, who talks in riddles. The only real respite he finds comes in the person of the waitress Sophia, but any reader of noir fiction known you can never really trust the dames.

It's been almost forty years since the world has seen a new Rabe novel, and The Silent Wall was definitely worth the wait. It reads like the culmination of Rabe's career: a hardboiled story that depends more on the interactions of its characters than the machinations of its plot, their conversations holding as much appeal as their actions.

Never before have I found so engrossing a story where basically the same thing happens over and over again (Matty tries to escape and is foiled). The ending of The Silent Wall roughly switches gears, becoming a strange combination of sexy and confounding that nevertheless keeps the pages turning to the finish. Though I read the tales here in a different order than the publisher intended, I think I made the right choice as the quality seemed to get better with each one.

Ghost Town by Ed Gorman (Western noir)

Author Ed Gorman's Western novels are primarily in the genre he calls "Western noir." In many ways — just about every way except the setting — Ghost Town is more like typical crime fiction than other, more traditional Westerns.

Prison-educated trial lawyer (and sometime thief and con artist) Bryce Lamont is keen to find his old partners Jed Wylie and Frank Stodla. Especially since they still owe him his cut from the job that put him away. He's tracked them down to the midwestern town of Wyatt, Wisconsin, where Jed and Frank appear to have gone legit as a banker and his handyman (though enforcer is more like it).

Unfortunately, a really bad malaria epidemic has hit Wylie, and Bryce's brother Paul has a particularly bad case of it, though Bryce refuses to believe it until he hears it from Laura, Paul's heretofore unmet fiancée and the local doctor. She is the only woman of dignity in a town of iniquity.

Bryce gets the money but loses his brother and sets out to find the ones responsible for Paul's death with only the help of a 15-year-old wannabe bounty hunter and a snake-oil salesman. Threaded throughout — and somehow tying in with all this — is the trial of one Jenny Rice, accused of murdering her own fiancée.

Gorman's Western novels are the perfect stepping stone for the crime-fiction enthusiast wanting to get his or her feet wet in the Western genre. Ghost Town doesn't shy away from the painful parts of life, covering unrequited love, the pain of loss, the suffering of sickness, and the anxiety of hiding from justice, among others.

Ed Gorman is one of my favorite Western writers. His works are largely influenced by the Gold Medal novels of the 1950s and '60s. Donald E. Westlake (to whom Ghost Town is dedicated) pointed out similarities to the Westerns of Will Charles (crime author Charles Willeford writing under a pseudonym), stories that Gorman had not read.

Willeford and Gorman approached their material in the same way, namely that criminals are the same no matter what time period they're living in. That's Western noir. What Gorman is doing with the Western that may not be new, but it's still a fresh approach that hasn't been done to death. He did not create the concept of Western noir, but he gave it a name, and he is certainly the best at it.

Further reading:
Vendetta by Ed Gorman — another Western noir, a multilayered story of revenge.
The Midnight Room by Ed Gorman — his own "Gold Medal novel" dedicated to "old friends who were masters of the form": Peter Rabe, Stephen Marlowe, William Campbell Gault, and Robert Colby.
The Hombre from Sonora by Will Charles — one of Charles Willeford's pseudonymous Westerns.

The Big Bang by Mickey Spillane and Max Allan Collins (Mike Hammer)

Mike Hammer went to Florida to recover from a stab wound from one of Junior Evello's boys — Junior is the nephew of Carl Evello from Kiss Me, Deadly — "that had opened my side like somebody wanted to slip in there and hide." On his first day back in Manhattan, he chances across hospital messenger Billy Blue being jumped by drug dealers who think he can get them easy access to the hospital's drug stash, and Hammer quickly dispatches the assailants with his signature brand of street justice.

It looks like Evello might be involved, but Hammer assures Homicide captain (and long-time friend) Pat Chambers that he has no interest in the case. Of course, when somebody tried to kill Mike, he gets interested fast. Now it's on.

The Big Bang is one of the handful of unfinished manuscripts Mickey Spillane entrusted to Max Allan Collins upon his death in 2006. Two others have been published previously: the non-Hammer Dead Street and the "last" Hammer novel chronologically, The Goliath Bone.

In addition to being about one-third complete, The Big Bang was also fully outlined and included the ending, which was one of Spillane's favorites. When the deadline for this book was approaching and it did not look like he could finish it, Spillane took the previously shelved "second" Hammer novel For Whom the Gods Would Destroy (he had written it after I, the Jury but quickly pounded out My Gun Is Quick as a followup instead), updated it with references to more recent cases, and sent that one in. It would be published under the title The Twisted Thing.

Spillane's and Collins's styles mesh well throughout The Big Bang, since Collins expanded Spillane's original one-third out to about one-half and then completed what was missing. Collins has somehow managed to produce a novel that is firmly grounded in the 1960s but does not feel dated. This is not an artifact, but a fully vital modern novel.

Collins stays mostly in the background, preferring to let his friend and mentor shine from beyond. Those who have followed Hammer through numerous adventures will appreciate it most, but The Big Bang can be enjoyed even by those relatively new to the detective.

One definite highlight is the climax, when Hammer unwittingly drops acid and sees his potential final moments with all the clarity of a warped record. ("Shotgun" by Junior Walker and the All-Stars gets a prominent role in the melee.)

But the ending of The Big Bang is just stunning, related to a huge shipment of heroin coming into the city (the "big bang" of the title — sorry physics fans, no beginning-of-the-universe theories discussed in these pages¹). It may in fact be one of the best of the series. Just don't try to skip ahead and read it because you won't understand its significance unless you've read the rest of the book. The whole thing is well orchestrated for maximum impact. It's a keeper and one that will likely go down as one of the more memorable.

At least one more of these Spillane/Collins collaborations (Kiss Her Goodbye) is already scheduled to be published. There are at least three more substantial manuscripts that could be completed: Complex 90 (a sequel to The Girl Hunters), Lady Go Die!, and King of the Weeds. However, whether these see their way into print depends, like all things in publishing, on how well these sell, so support them however you can (preferably with your wallet) and help Spillane's legacy continue well into the future.

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¹Try What's Next?: Dispatches from the Future of Science for that — specifically Sean Carroll's "Our Place in an Unnatural Universe."

Nobody's Angel by Jack Clark (Hard Case Crime)

It's another self-publishing success story — 14 years after the fact. Author Jack Clark was nominated for the Shamus Award for his 2002 professional debut Westerfield's Chain. But back in 1996, he was still a beginning writer making ends meet by driving a cab in Chicago.

Following the old advice of "write what you know," Clark set his first novel Nobody's Angel in and around the Chicago taxicab community. Then, with apparently a good head for cross-merchandising as well as a talent for fiction, he printed up 500 copies and sold them for five dollars each to his fares.

When Clark first sent Nobody's Angel to Charles Ardai of Hard Case Crime for a possible reprint, Ardai had low expectations due to its self-published history. But it far exceeded his expectations, and now it's available again, for only three dollars more than the first edition.

Someone is killing cabbies and hookers. Though his fares assume he must be, Eddie Miles isn't all that worried about it. But Eddie doesn't worry about much, content to prowl the streets of Chicago in his hack, and even "go south" (to the rougher sections of the city) if it pays. The murders affect Eddie personally when a friend of his is one of the victims (Eddie was the last to see him alive), and again when his headlights discover a teenage prostitute left to die in an alley trash pile. Her name is Relita, and Eddie becomes her reluctant "angel," going to visit her at the hospital since her doctor says she only lights up when he comes. But, like the title says, Eddie is Nobody's Angel, not even his own.

Nobody's Angel is a little thin on plot, but it's definitely noir through and through. The main thing that keeps the pages turning is Eddie himself. He's intensely likable, even with his flaws, and it's a treat to watch his day to day existence as a cabbie. Clark makes every passenger an individual. Whether they're flirting with Miles, pranking him, or asking too many questions, they're all equally memorable, and Clark's confident style flows easily across the page.

I don't want to get into this too deeply, at the risk of revealing too much — spoiler warning? — but Eddie's likability actually fooled me. I thought he was something that he isn't. This made the ending seem ultra dark and somewhat disappointing, since I had invested so much in his decisions up to that point.

In retrospect, however, Clark is entirely true to his character. My surprise was due to my own wishes and expectations. Consequently, Nobody's Angel was a powerful read in addition to a well-written one, and it still has me thinking about it. I'm not sure yet how I feel about it, but I know that its effect on me alone qualifies it as a great achievement.

Spade and Archer by Joe Gores (the prequel to The Maltese Falcon by Dashiell Hammett)

If you've just stumbled upon this page looking for information about shovels and arrows, let me educate you. This is a review of Spade and Archer, the prequel novel to possibly the best-known and most influential private eye novel (that it's one of the best goes without saying), Dashiell Hammett's The Maltese Falcon, and the title characters are business partners in a detective agency.

The "Spade" of the title is Sam Spade, star of the novel, its 3 film adaptations, and a long-running old-time radio series. We don't learn much about Archer in The Maltese Falcon, other than that he's a bit of a lecher and that Spade is having an affair with his wife, whom Spade refuses to be the one to inform when her husband is murdered early in the book (in part due to his being a bit of a lecher).

I hope I'm not spoiling The Maltese Falcon for anyone who's not experienced it, but if you don't know and love it, why are you reading about a prequel? Anyway, what relatively few people know is that there was a sequel to the book written for the radio show Suspense. Writer/producer William Speir at the time was overseeing both Suspense and The Adventures of Sam Spade, and, great marketer that he was, thought it would be a good idea to get listeners of the former to check out the latter. Unfortunately, "The Khandi Tooth Caper" (broadcast in January 1948) is a weak attempt to resuscitate the major characters, so I'm not sure the experiment worked, especially since the radio Spade (as played by Howard Duff) is a much more light-hearted fellow than the one Bogart made famous.

So, it's about time somebody like author Joe Gores — a former P.I. himself, the winner of three Edgar Awards (for first novel, short story, and teleplay) and the author of Hammett the novel — made a really decent try at reusing these characters in a way that's not simply exploiting their popularity.

Gores does this and more. In giving us insight into the previous lives of Spade, Archer, and Effie, Gores actually enhances the experience of rereading The Maltese Falcon. So, what he's done here is not only create an entertaining novel of his own, but in the process he's also made the source material better! Gores does an excellent job with the period (1921–1928) and setting (San Francisco), even referencing the Fatty Arbuckle case, one that Hammett himself worked on while with the Pinkerton Agency during the same period Spade and Archer takes place. Gores also paints a realistic portrait of a younger Spade, not quite as jaded (though a colleague married Sam's best girl three months after he enlisted in the Army) but still nobody's sap.

It's 1921, and private detective Sam Spade has left the Continental Detective Agency (a thinly veiled portrait of the Pinkerton Detective Agency of which Dashiell Hammett himself was an operative) after "too much head-knocking and not enough door-knocking" and goes out on his own. His new secretary, Effie Perrine, is the first of four girls to answer his ad, and she smoothly tells the three that follow that the position has already been filled. The book continues and covers two other cases, in 1925 and 1928. Since this is a novel, the three cases are of course related, but Gores does a good job of keeping things interesting in the meantime.

Readers looking for a replay of The Maltese Falcon will find a less polished Spade with a penchant for undercover work. (Once he uses "Nick Charles" as an alias.) They may be less than interested in the decidedly unsexy mystery involving a stowaway teen and stolen gold, the death of a bank president, and the search for recognition by an illegitimate Chinese daughter. Also disappointing is the lack of a memorable supporting characters on par with Casper Gutman (except for Effie, who deserves her own book).

Reader Scott Brick's low-key delivery suits the noir atmosphere admirably in the audiobook version of Spade and Archer. His Spade manages to sound familiar without resorting to impersonation. (For a stellar recent interpretation, hear Michael Madsen in the Grammy- and Audie-nominated audiobook adaptation of The Maltese Falcon written and directed by Yuri Rasovsky. It also features stunning turns by Sandra Oh — who embodies the femme fatale using only her voice, quite a feat if you think about it — and Edward Herrmann, whose mimicry of Sidney Greenstreet is akin to resurrection.)

At over twice the length, Spade and Archer doesn't have the tight feel of its "sequel." But Gores' portrayal of Spade is authentic and multidimensional. It is what will keep you reading when the other portions no longer hold your interest. Rich with detail and character (I had forgotten that Spade wears green and white pajamas), it is a respectable companion that adds to the big picture and stands fine on its own.

Whether Gores has created a classic of his own remains to be seen, but Spade and Archer is as good an attempt to define Sam Spade as anyone could have done. Readers looking for deep insight into Archer will be disappointed, however, since not much is learned that wasn't already known from Hammett. But those simply wanting to see Spade solve another case (or three) will be more than pleased. Gores taps into the reader's nostalgia for the '20s (both real and fictional) with great success and leaves the reader smiling.

Further Reading:
Hammett by Joe Gores — the writer comes out from behind the typewriter to solve another case.
Devil's Garden by Ace Atkins — fictionalizes Hammett's work on the Arbuckle case.
Interface by Joe Gores — Thrilling Detective describes the ending as "possibly the best ... since Sam Spade refused to play the sap for Brigid O'Shaughnessy."

Christmas Crime: Snow Angels by James Thompson (an Inspector Kari Vaara mystery)

Lapland is in the northern part of Finland, located 100 miles inside the Arctic Circle. This time of year, there is almost 24 hours of darkness. One week before Christmas, Sufia Elmi, a Somalian B-movie actress at least as famous for her looks as for her talent, has been found dead in three feet of snow. Her body was mutilated, with "nigger whore" carved into her stomach (likely while she was still alive), and her struggles have formed the shape of a snow angel around her body.

The case is taken by Laplander police inspector Kari Vaara. Is it a race crime or a sex crime? Is it the first of a potential series of killings? Either way, Vaara says of the crime, "There's a lot of hate here." Coincidentally, Sufia has been murdered in the same place Vaara met his wife Kate, an American. (In a flashback, we discover his name means "Rock Danger" or something equally silly in English. He tells Kate, "I promise it sounds better in Finnish.")

Snow Angels (published as Lumienkelit in Finland) is the first in a new mystery series from author James Thompson. A Kentucky-born American who has lived in Finland for over a decade, Thompson is able to write knowledgably of the environment and society while retaining an outsider's eye for important details.

Thompson embraces the dark side of society much like his namesake Jim Thompson (the name under which this author is published outside the U.S.). Both Vaara and Kate share a bad childhood and a bum leg, Vaara still hasn't dealt with his role in the death of his sister Suvi, and these are only two of the things hanging over Vaara's head in this Finnish noir.

Vaara quickly discovers that this case is going to get personal. The prime suspect is the man whose credit card paid for Sufia's residence, a Helsinki bigwig named Seppo Niemi, also coincidentally the man that Vaara's ex-wife left him for 13 years ago. So now, in addition to a national chief of police who wants him off the case and responding officers who want to go on vacation, Vaara has to deal with an ex-wife who thinks that the arrest of Niemi constitutes some kind of "dish best eaten cold" revenge by Vaara for her leaving him.

Numerous other suspects arise through various sexual connections. (Sufia's father thought she was pure, but forensic evidence suggests this to be far from the truth.) As their numbers decrease through attrition, the investigation zeroes in on a few.

Things eventually get so personal for Vaara that he wants to recuse himself, but by that time he needs to solve the case or ruin his career. But if he keeps on, his marriage to Kate, months pregnant with his child, may be ruined by his intense focus away from her. Can he both see justice served and be home for Christmas dinner? The solution is both shocking and fairly played.

Thompson is a skilled wordsmith who writes invisible prose that lets the culture and all the dark undercurrents come flowing off the page in an almost overwhelming gush. Snow Angels is a dark and engrossing read that will be best appreciated by fans of modern European noir writers.

Vendetta by Ed Gorman (Western noir)

Father Pete Madsen's best friend Noah Greaves was released from prison and was subsequently killed trying to exact revenge on the one reason he was there: Tom Radigan. Noah's daughter Joan decides to finish what her father set out to do, but that's not the only revenge being enacted in Vendetta. Simple stories are not author Ed Gorman's stock in trade.

Vendetta beautifully showcases Gorman's skill at characterization through various lengthy passages from different points of view. In this way, we more closely follow the actions of Joan Greaves; her quarry, Radigan; his lover, Caroline Petty; her husband, chief of police Walter Petty; his assistant chief, Red Carney; and bank-robbing brothers, Carl and Leonard Schmidt.

Gorman puts the reader inside his characters' heads and gives us access to their most private thoughts. All the while offering suspenseful narrative that leaves questions unanswered until the reader is simply aching to find out how these complex and interconnected relationships will out.

His ability to make the villain of one story into the tragic hero of another only enhances the reader's involvement in the tale. The centerpiece of Vendetta, a 4-hour bank robbery, brings all the characters together in one place and brings their tensions to a head. The ending floored me.

Best of all, Vendetta is a story that could be set in any time or place. The events are universal and timeless. That Gorman has set it in the Old West merely allows the author to utilize aspects specific to the era while showing that people really haven't changed all that much. It will appeal to fans of Westerns and crime fiction (given that Gorman calls his style "Western noir") or any enthusiasts of solid storytelling. (Fans of modern westerns will appreciate the cameo from a gunsmith named "J.R. Randisi.")

Reader of the unabridged audiobook, Scott Brick's dysthymic delivery is perfect for Gorman's tight prose. Brick is one of my favorite all-around audiobook readers due to his ability to avoid inserting himself into the story; he's a fresh canvas primed for any material, and offers a letter-perfect interpretation of Vendetta.

Where Everything Ends by Ray Bradbury (an omnibus of Death Is a Lonely Business, A Graveyard for Lunatics, and Let's All Kill Constance)

This review originally appeared in somewhat different form on The Green Man Review. Copyright 2009. Reprinted with permission.

The subtitle "The Mystery Novels of Ray Bradbury" quickly tells us what's between the covers of Where Everything Ends, a collection of an underappreciated portion of the author's bibliography: three crime novels written between 1985 and 2003 that feature an unnamed narrator/protagonist (very much Bradbury's doppelganger) and detective Elmo Crumley dealing with mysteries during the Golden Age of Hollywood.

The title piece, published here for the first time, is the short story that came first and inspired the rest. Reading it after the novels (it is placed at the back), it comes across as definitely a lesser work: one written by an author still trying to get his bearings in the genre. And he makes the beginner's mistake of focusing too much on how the crime was done instead of on his own forte, character. Luckily, Bradbury eventually combined the two and produced three novels that equal his speculative output in skill and heart, if not necessarily excitement.

In 1985, over twenty years since the publication of his last full-length work, 1962's Something Wicked This Way Comes, Ray Bradbury reentered the novel-writing world with the release of Death Is a Lonely Business, his first foray into a genre epitomized by Dashiell Hammett, Raymond Chandler, and Ross Macdonald — namely the crime investigation novel.

The narrator of Death Is a Lonely Business is a writer living in Venice, California, where the local carnival pier is being demolished. He discovers the body of Willie Smith, underwater and trapped in a disused lion cage. Then a strange shadowy figure begins appearing in hallways and outside windows at night, and the number of murders increases. The narrator teams with local police detective Elmo Crumley — reluctantly, at first, on Crumley's part — to solve the case. The only clues they have are the writer's intuition, articles that go missing from the deceased's residences, and a blind man's keen sense of smell.

Death Is a Lonely Business has many layers to it. First, on the surface, it's a fine noir pastiche. Second, our hero is especially interesting as a portrait of Bradbury himself in 1949. The naive, plump, 27-year-old writer, who is just becoming successful, inspires immediate identification from fans of the master's work. We already like the author, so we immediately root for his doppelganger.

I especially enjoyed the personal clues Bradbury laid within the story, some of which take a brave person to lay bare in print. But they work to gain our sympathy, which is quite necessary; in the beginning the writer is painted — whether deliberately or not — as a somewhat unsympathetic character prone to outbursts.

The other characters are just as fascinating: Crumley, the cop who just happens to also be a writer; Fannie, the 380-pound sedentary soprano; A.L. Shrank, the psychiatrist with the downbeat library; Cal, the incompetent barber with the ragtime past; John Wilkes Hopworth, the ex-silent film star who still pines for former love Constance Rattigan, his former costar who is dead set on not becoming Norma Desmond from Sunset Boulevard ("That dimwit Norma wants a new career; all I want most days is to hole up and not come out"); and Henry, the blind man, who is the only one who can identify the killer — by his smell.

Five years later, the author revisited the genre with 1990's A Graveyard for Lunatics, subtitled "Another Tale of Two Cities." It is now 1954, and the Bradbury character is working for Maximus Films as a screenwriter. The studio is separated from Green-Grade Cemetery by a single brick wall, and during a late-night studio party on the eve of Halloween, the screenwriter receives a note that "a great revelation awaits" him on the other side of the wall: "material for a best-selling novel or terrific screenplay." A timid soul, he hesitates but cannot resist. There he finds a body — or is it? Because the body is that of a studio head who supposedly died twenty years ago.

A Graveyard for Lunatics centers around the solving of the mystery, but it's primarily of interest to fans as a lengthy roman à clef of Bradbury's time working on King of Kings.

Famous Hollywood figures appear, operating under pseudonyms, such as the screenwriter's best friend, special effects master Roy Holdstrom (obviously Bradbury compatriot Ray Harryhausen). Even Jesus Christ (called "J.C.," resident of 911 Beechwood in Hollywood) is a prominent character, given his starring role in the film.

Though inspired by hard-boiled works, Bradbury's protagonist/alter ego is as soft-boiled as you can get. He's a sweetheart, an innocent — when Constance Rattigan arises nude from the sea, he looks her in the eyes — a bright child in a man's body. (Yet he's completely up to the task of a heart-racing fight to the death underwater.) The tone more closely matches that of Agatha Christie, but A Graveyard for Lunatics is a solid mystery as only Ray Bradbury could write it.

In 2003, Bradbury revisited Elmo Crumley and company with Let's All Kill Constance. In the opening, Constance Rattigan comes into the Bradbury character's home bearing two books: a 1900 telephone directory and her own personal address book. Some names in both books are crossed out entirely: these are names of those no longer of this earth. Others are circled with a cross beside them, one of them Constance's, and she believes that this means she is one of the next to die. On leaving the books with the writer, she disappears.

Let's All Kill Constance is not quite as good as its predecessors, but any Bradbury is worth reading. His particular style is always welcome, its familiarity alone bringing a level of comfort to the experience — like revisiting an old friend.

The mystery itself is not as interesting as the characters and their relationships with each other. Although it feels at times (as with the female impersonator) that Bradbury is simply creating a character to fill his plot needs, he still makes each real enough to justify the time spent with them.

The bulk of Let's All Kill Constance concerns the search for the title character. Teaming up again with detective Elmo Crumley, the Bradbury character meets several people involved with Constance's past (many of whom she has just left when the writer and Crumley arrive) and puts together the pieces into a disturbing yet satisfying solution illustrative of the difficulties inherent in being a Hollywood actress.

But through all this Bradbury's youthful exuberance shines. The writer's enthusiasm for life comes through as unadulterated innocence. He seems not to be jaded at all by the modern world, and so the novels contained in Where Everything Ends are not as "noir" as they would have been in other hands. And yet, it's refreshing to have, as a hero in this genre, a person whom the world has not made a pessimist.

Where Everything Ends is a trio of fine novels from Bradbury (together with the short story that provided the starting point), detective novels done in Bradbury's inimitable style. He plays with the conventions, but since he so obviously loves the genre, this is easily forgiven — embraced, even — because the end results are, simply put, fine additions to the canon. This trilogy plus one is also dear to fans because it is likely the closest thing to an autobiography we will receive from this man who has brought so much joy to so many people for so many years.