1935 - H.J. Ward
1936 - Norman Saunders
1936 - Norman Saunders
Pulp Gallery: MYSTERY ADVENTURES (1935-36)
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Forgotten Books: The Executioner 42 - THE IRANIAN HIT by Stephen Mertz
Back in the '70s, The Executioner was one of my favorite series. Don Pendleton's prose was stylish and compelling. The plotting was tight, and the action came fast and furious. Mack Bolan was a new breed of pulp hero, more deadly than The Shadow, The Spider and all of his other predecessors combined. I read the first thirty-eight books (all but one by Pendleton himself) and liked them so much I read them again.
But after number 38, the magic died. Pendleton sold the series - including his own name - to a new publisher, and everything changed. Bolan's one-man war against the Mafia was over. He got a new name -John Phoenix- and was sanctioned by the government to fight terrorists and other threats to freedom around the world. I tried a couple of the new ones, but they didn't grab me, and I bid the series a fond farewell.
Then last year, after enjoying a few Steve Mertz books, I decided to hunt down his contributions to the series. And damn, I'm glad I did. Steve assisted Don Pendleton on some of the original books, and developed a great feel for the character. The Iranian Hit is the first (of twelve) that he wrote on his own, and it reads like the real thing.
This book was published in 1982. Here's yours truly
talking to the author himself at the 1982 Bouchercon.
(Photo courtesy of Sir Arthur Scott)
From the title, I figured Bolan would be kicking Iranian butt over in Iran. But nope, this one takes place in the suburbs of Washington D.C., and while a lot of the kicked butts belong to Iranians, an equal number are attached to his old playmates in the Mafia. A renegade Iranian general has snubbed his nose at the Ayatollah and set up his own criminal operation in the U.S. Now Khomeini has sent a hit squad after him, and while U.S. officials would like to see the general dead, they can't let the Iranians take him out on our soil. So who they gonna call? Mack Bolan, of course.
This one brought back a lot of memories, reminding me why the original series was so great. I'll be digging into the rest of the Mertz entries, which, for the records, are numbers 43, 48, 52, 62, 64, 67, 73, 76, 92, 94 and the unnumbered opus Dirty War.
Meanwhile, The Executioner has been rolling right along. It boggles the mind to realize the original series is now up to number 435, and there have been more than 300 additional adventures published as Stony Man, Super-Bolan and plain old Mack Bolan books. Does that make Bolan the busiest fictional character of all time? Is there any other hero who has starred in more than 700 novels? Maybe you can think of one, but I sure can't. And here's an even bigger question: Is there any living human who has read all 700+ books? Yikes!
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Toy Soldier Saturday: REL Cowboys
I think this Rel outfit put most of their efforts into making dollhouses and dollhouse furniture and dollhouse people, but they took time out to make some odd-looking cowboys too. These guys were made in both hard (as shown) and soft plastic.
This guy, who belongs on a stage coach or wagon seat, is about halfway between hard and soft, and seems to be made of some sort of resin. I'll introduce you to some odd-looking Rel redskins sometime soon.
Our Toy Soldier archive is HERE.
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Get Your Dance On: SHAKIN' ALL OVER by The Guess Who
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Cap Gun Monday: Hubley RIFLEMAN
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Overlooked Films: RICHARD DIAMOND, PRIVATE DETECTIVE in "Custody"
Here's the second episode of this series, originally broadcast in July 1957, when the show still retained some of its noir roots. The title "Call Mr. D" was used when the show went into syndication. The dialogue and narration sounds true to the earlier radio show, but while Dick Powell's delivery made the lines funny, David Janssen sounds serious.
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Comic Gallery: CRIME DOES NOT PAY (1944)
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Pulp Gallery: DAN TURNER, HOLLYWOOD DETECTIVE (1942-43)
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A Recycled Forgotten Book: DEAD AT THE TAKE-OFF by Lester Dent
Left Coast Crime started yesterday and has me in its grip. I'm busting my butt to get ready for tomorrow's panel on Pulp Detectives. So... I'm falling back on that great American tradition - a rerun.
Lester Dent’s career has enjoyed a resurgence of late. I expect he’s smiling down - or up - from wherever he now resides. Nostalgia Ventures has put dozens of his Doc Savage novels back in print, with many more to come, and he’s finally getting the credit instead of “Kenneth Robeson”. Heliograph issued a collection called Lester Dent’s Zeppelin Tales. Black Dog Books has published three volumes of The Lester Dent Library: Dead Men’s Bones (air adventures), The Skull Squadron (air war), and Hell’s Hoofprints (westerns). And most recently - and no doubt most satisfying to Mr. Dent - Hard Case Crime released his unpublished novel, Honey in his Mouth.
But there are still forgotten Dent novels. Six appeared in book form during his lifetime. The first of these, published under Doubleday’s Crime Club imprint in 1946, was Dead at the Take-Off.
The hero of this one is Chance Molloy. Sounds like a good name for a P.I., or maybe a gambler. Nope. This guy is the once-rich and still powerful owner of an airline company. His chief antagonist is a corrupt U.S. Senator, Senator Lord (who is described as having godlike power). The backstory is that Molloy has invested up to his eyeballs based on the belief the army will sell him transport planes after the war. But Senator Lord, owner of a competing airline, has employed dirty tricks to nix the deal. As a result, Molloy’s despondent brother (and partner) commits suicide. Molloy is prepared to use any means necessary to expose Lord, avenge his brother and save his company - even if that means using Lord’s innocent daughter against him.
What follows is a complex plot with a wide cast of characters, many of whom are also quite complex. Though there are a number of stock characters too, this is not a Doc Savage novel. It’s the real thing. Point of view shifts frequently, much more frequently than is common in today’s fiction. There are enough character arcs to make your head spin, but Dent handles it them all with ease.
There are at several subplots going at once. The romantic subplot alone could power a whole book. Both the captain and co-pilot are in love with the stewardess, who happens to be Molloy’s ex-girlfriend - and her soon-to-be-ex husband is aboard plotting revenge. Meanwhile, Molloy is falling for the Senator’s daughter. But as crazy as everything gets, Dent wraps it all up in the end.
The main reason I read this, and the main reason I enjoyed it, is Dent’s style - an easy blend of smart, hardboiled prose and dry humor. I have the second (and last) Chance Molloy book, Lady to Kill, in my to-be-read pile.
An unintentionally interesting aspect of this book is the picture of commercial airline travel circa 1945. Instead of proceeding immediately to the airline terminal, passengers purchase tickets at the company’s office in downtown New York, where billiards, ping pong and reading materials are available in the lounge. They are then ferried by limousine - at their own expense - to the airport. On boarding the plane, they are allowed to smoke, bring their own liquor, and even carry guns. They’re seated in compartments of four seats each, as in old railway cars, and the seats fold down into beds. The restrooms are spacious lounges, with two toilets on the side. Ah, the Golden Age of air travel.
NOTE: I read the Crime Club edition, but without a dust jacket the cover is less than picturesque. The Ace Double version was retitled High Stakes. Why? Maybe to fit better on the spine with the flipside, Nightshade by John N. Makris.
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Toy Soldier Saturday: The Return of the Pirates of the MPC
Am I brain dead after day two of Left Coast Crime? You bet your ass I am. So here's another recycled post. It's a pretty good one, though.
In the late 50s and early 60s, the Multiple Plastics Corporation (known as MPC) produced 60mm soft plastic figures known as "ringhands" because their hands had holes to accommodate a variety of accessories. Each guy was about 2 5/8 inches tall. There were cowboys, Indians, frontiersmen, Civil War and Revolutionary War soldiers, African warriors, G.I.s, cops, firemen, space explorers, and probably others that are slipping my mind. My favorites were the pirates.
Each figure also had a hole in the base, to slip over a peg on certain larger accessories. For cowboys, these pegs were in wagons, for Indians they were in canoes. The pirates had ships!
Some of the accessories pictured here are the row boat and oars, shovel, anchor, sword and hat.
At the bow of the blue ship there's a plank, in case anyone needs to walk it, and a red lantern. (At the upper right is a Skyler Hobbs accessory. This is the actual Superman-blue PT Cruiser driven by Jason Wilder in the Hobbs stories.)
This peg-legged guy, no doubt inspired by Long John Silver, has a parrot on his shoulder. Near his right leg is a treasure chest.
I know it's hard to see, but the guy steering the red ship has a cat-o-nine tails. Nautical trivia: The cat, a short whip tipped with nine knotted strips of leather, was normally kept in a bag when not in use. When the time came to flay some unlucky transgressor, the cat came out. This was the origin of the saying - yep, you guessed it - "the cat's out of the bag."
This dangerous looking dude has a pick in his left fist. The yellow guy visible behind him is preparing to bop somebody with a boarding pike.
More MPC ringhands HERE.
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Song Twins: HULLY GULLY and PEANUT BUTTER
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Cap Gun Monday: Hubley COYOTE
This one's on the small side - 8 inches long - but it's all metal and has plenty of scrollwork, giving it a cool ornate look. Why's it called Coyote? Beats me. There's nothing mangy about it.
More Cap Guns HERE.
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It happened at Left Coast Crime
The Right Reverend Cap'n Bob Napier enthralls the crowd on "It's a Living: Odd Jobs & Strange Professions." With moderator Linda Joffe Hull, Diane Valler, Tammy Kaehler and Camille Minichino.
Christine Finlayson (far right) wrangles "The Great Outdoors: Murder in Nature," with Shannon Baker, Mark Stevens and Christine Carbo.
David Schlosser (left) waxes eloquent on "Editing Your Own Work: Approaches to Rewriting," with Hannah Dennison, Margaret Lucke, Philip Margolin and Judith Janeway.
And Doug Levin shows off the 2002 book containing his first published story. It was priced at well over two hundred bucks, but well worth it, I'm sure.
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Pulp Gallery: THRILLING MYSTERY
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"The Continental Opposite" in AHMM
I'm mighty pleased to announce that the May 2015 issue of AHMM is now on sale, featuring a story inspired by Mr. Dashiell Hammett - and the great nonfiction book Portland Confidential by Phil Stanford.
It's 1953, and Portland's mayor, police chief and half the force are in the pocket of the mob. Things are so bad that the even the local branch of the Continental agency is corrupt, so the bosses bring Hammett's Continental Op out of retirement and send him to Portland to clean up the town. And it's going to be a big job, so this is only the first in a series . . .
If you can't find a print copy of this issue at your local Barnes & Noble, there are several places you can grab an e-copy. And it's cheaper. Here are a few I know about:
- Amazon offers single issues for Kindle, iPad or PC for $3.49. That's HERE.
- Barnes & Noble sells it for Nook, also $3.49, HERE.
- Google Play has it for android devices, $3.49, HERE.
- Magzter sells it for $3.99, HERE.
And here's a preview. It's FREE.
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Forgotten Books: THE CONTINENTAL OP (1974) by Dashiell Hammett
The Continental Op (1974) was an important book in the field of Hammettology. It was, I believe, the first hardcover publication of the seven Op stories contained herein, and, at the time of its publication, most had been out of print for more than twenty-five years.
UPDATE! Don Herron wrote to say these are indeed the Dannay versions of the stories. See his blog post HERE.
Not counting the two serialized novels (each comprised of four connected novelettes), there were 28 adventures of the Continental Op. The ten best, as selected by Lillian Hellman, had already been reprinted in The Big Knockover (1966), and the seven collected here could fairly be called the best of the rest.
So what's the difference? The earliest tales, mostly from 1923, are competent, straight-forward and well-written mysteries, but the Op displays very little personality. In fact, he's nearly invisible.The stories in this book, most from 1924, show the Op in transition. Hammett's style is growing more distinct, and the Op's character is beginning to emerge. In the later stories, and particularly in the related novelettes "The Big Knockover" and "$106,000 Blood Money," and the novel Red Harvest, the Op emerges in all his hardboiled glory. Based on style, I believe that the two last stories in this volume, appearing in Black Mask in 1927 and 1930, were written much earlier.
Still, second-rate Hammett stories are better than many writers' best, and these are well worth reading. Here's a list of the contents with original publication dates. All now appear in the Library of America volume Dashiell Hammett: Crime Stories and Other Writings.
The Tenth Clew (from Black Mask Jan. 1, 1924)
The Golden Horseshoe (from Black Mask Nov. 1924)
The House in Turk Street (from Black Mask Apr. 1924)
The Girl with the Silver Eyes (from Black Mask June 1924)
The Whosis Kid (from Black Mask Mar. 1925)
The Main Death (from Black Mask June 1927)
The Farewell Murder (from Black Mask Feb. 1930)
Links to this week's Forgotten Books appear (I think) on pattinase.
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Coming Soon: The ARGOSY LIBRARY from Altus Books
We take time out from our Continental Op tribute to share this great news from Altus Press. Pretty dang soon (hopefully by May) Altus will roll out the first ten books of their ARGOSY LIBRARY. Argosy was one of the best of the pulps, and all these books look good. Even cooler, there will be many more to come.
Here's the word from the official press release:
Founded at the end of the Nineteenth Century by publishing tycoon Frank A. Munsey, Argosy Magazinequickly became one of the most popular—and prestigious—fiction magazines of its day and spawned a publishing revolution.
Known as one of the most literate pulp magazines, Argosypublished thousands of short stories and novels, many of which features some of the most influential series characters in popular fiction.
With the inauguration of The Argosy Library, Altus Press plans to bring back into print the best of the Frank A. Munsey Company, sourced from its suite of sibling titles such as Argosy, The All-Story, and Flynn’s Detective Fiction Weekly, among others.
The Argosy Library expects to showcase the varied mix of genres that made Argosy one of the most popular pulps of all time, and Series 1 does just that by showcasing adventure, mystery, western, science fiction, fantasy, and crime stories by some of Munsey’s most popular authors such as Lester Dent, W. Wirt, Otis Adelbert Kline, W.C. Tuttle, George F. Worts, and Theodore Roscoe, among others.
The Argosy Library will be released in series of ten books at a time—in matching trade dress—and will be available in softcover, hardcover, and ebook editions. In addition to being available separately, each series of releases can be purchased as a single, heavily-discounted set.
Known as one of the most literate pulp magazines, Argosypublished thousands of short stories and novels, many of which features some of the most influential series characters in popular fiction.
With the inauguration of The Argosy Library, Altus Press plans to bring back into print the best of the Frank A. Munsey Company, sourced from its suite of sibling titles such as Argosy, The All-Story, and Flynn’s Detective Fiction Weekly, among others.
The Argosy Library expects to showcase the varied mix of genres that made Argosy one of the most popular pulps of all time, and Series 1 does just that by showcasing adventure, mystery, western, science fiction, fantasy, and crime stories by some of Munsey’s most popular authors such as Lester Dent, W. Wirt, Otis Adelbert Kline, W.C. Tuttle, George F. Worts, and Theodore Roscoe, among others.
The Argosy Library will be released in series of ten books at a time—in matching trade dress—and will be available in softcover, hardcover, and ebook editions. In addition to being available separately, each series of releases can be purchased as a single, heavily-discounted set.
And here are the first ten books:
The gold-dusted saga of a red-bearded young giant, raised in the Arctic on seal-meat and encyclopedias, who descends on civilization with a loud and solid crash. In his search for wisdom and adventure, the man Jones doesn’t have Aladdin’s lamp—but he doesn’t really need it…. Never before reprinted, it’s the longest novel Lester Dent ever published, and one of the most famous. This edition restores text cut from its original publication. With an Introduction by Will Murray.(Evan here: I've been waiting a LONG time for this one.)
Once voted Adventure Magazine’s most popular author, W.C. Tuttle introduced the world to one of his longest-running, and most popular series characters, Henry Harrison Conroy, in the pages of Argosy. Collected here are the first four stories. Introduction by Sai Shankar.
Harry Thorne, explorer and swordsman, had scarcely more than heard of the Red Planet, Mars—when an amazing thing happened…. Otis Adelbert Kline is well-known as one of the best fantasy/adventure contemporaries of Edgar Rice Burroughs. This edition is sourced from the original magazine text and includes all of the original illustrations.
Mystery runs rampant in the quiet, upstate New York town of Four Corners…. Easily one of Roscoe’s best-written series, Volume 1 collects the first half of this lost masterpiece of the pulps.
Trees of living gold in the Amazon jungles, guarded by alligators, poisoned darts and rival hunters—such was the lodestone that drew an American expedition, and the unwilling Pete Holcomb….
The sagas of Jimmie Cordie and his crew were among Argosy’s most popular series when it was brought to that magazine during its early ’30s renaissance. Quite clearly an inspiration for the creation of Doc Savage, this edition collects his first nine adventures.
When Jim Fallon started for the Hudson Bay country, he wasn’t sure whether he was on a man-hunt or a wild goose chase—but he found his quest was fraught with real enough peril. Among the best novels ever written by one of Argosy’s most popular authors.
One of Argosy’s most popular authors pens this never-before reprinted novel of a trail of crime that ran from sleepy Maple Hollow to Steel City.
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THE CONTINENTAL OP (1945, 1946) by Dashiell Hammett
Yeah, I have the Continental Op (and my new AHMM story "The Continental Opposite," previewed HERE) on the brain, so I'm presenting this encore performance of a Forgotten Book post from 2012. I'll present lots more Op stuff a the week rolls on.
The Continental Op has been used as the title of several collections, but the one we're talking about here is the original, published in digest in 1945 and paperback in 1946. This collection was one of many edited and compiled by Frederick Dannay (half of the Ellery Queen team) and Don Herron's frequent guest-blogger Terry Zobeck has demonstrated that Dannay altered the text of many of the stories.
The four tales in this book, however, appear to have largely escaped Dannay's heavy hand. The 2001 collection Hammett: Crime Stories & Other Writings contains the original Black Mask versions of all four stories, and while I didn't compare each tale word-for-word, I did some spot checks and failed to find any changes other than punctuation or spelling.
One of the most interesting aspects of the Continental Op series is the way it displays Hammett's growth as a writer. All 28 stories (and at least one of the two novels) are good, but the quality of Hammett's prose changes dramatically from the Op's first appearance in 1923 to the first installment of the Op masterpiece Red Harvest in 1927.
In the beginning, Hammett's Op was practically an invisible man. He displayed no personality, and his matter-of-fact prose was designed to educate the reader on realistic investigative practices. But bit by bit, story by story, the Op's character begins to emerge.
Two of the stories in this collection, "Zigzags of Treachery" and "Death on Pine Street" (originally titled "Women, Politics and Murder"), were first published in 1924 and are transitional tales. The Op indulges himself with a wisecrack now and then, and we see Hammett stretching his writing muscles. A third story, "The Farewell Murder," did not appear in Black Mask until 1930, but was clearly written far earlier - most likely in 1923.
The beginning of the "The Farewell Murder" may have been inspired by an old vampire movie. It opens with a chauffeur driving the Op up a dark and winding road to the client's home. On the way they see a body in the road, which scares the heebie-jeebies out of the driver. When the Op goes to investigate, the chauffeur vanishes into the woods. The rest of the story involves men who did each other dirt in Egypt and have now brought their blood feud to the States. The Op uncovers a clever scheme by one of the feuders.
"Zigzags of Treachery" is a peculiar combination of old and new. The first few pages are a monologue by the attorney/client involving some old time melodrama. The middle of the story displays some realistic detective work with only occasional bits of flavor. And the end is a monologue by the chief crook, explaining his part in the scheme. This time it's the Op who delivers the clever finish.
"Death on Pine Street" begins with a familiar problem - the murder of a philandering husband, but displays hints of the Op's wit, humor and capacity for violence. In the end he socks a guy purely for payback. And yeah, it's another clever ending.
But the highlight of the collection is "Fly Paper." This story appeared in Black Mask in 1929, after both Red Harvest and The Dain Curse, and shows the Op at his best. Every line of the narration is tight, tough and packed with wit. The story peers under the lid of the seamy underworld, into a complex plot that ends with a wild manhunt and shootout. Little wonder Lillian Hellman selected it for inclusion in The Big Knockover (where she subjected it to further, and more drastic, changes in punctuation).
These four stories are well worth your time, and can be found in other collections. What you won't find elsewhere is the introduction by "Ellery Queen." And that, too, is worth your time. So here it is:
More Op stuff coming soon. More Forgotten Books right now at pattinase.
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Pulp Gallery: THE CONTINENTAL OP (Part 1)
"Arson Plus" Oct 1 1923
Today and tomorrow we proudly present peeks at the covers of all but one of the 36 magazines featuring first appearances of Continental Op stories. Most of these were borrowed, with much gratitude, from the spectacular website Galactic Central. That's HERE. The first Black Mask cover (above), and the sole issue of True Detective Mysteries, appeared on Don Herron's always-interesting blog, Up and Down These Mean Streets, HERE.
"Slippery Fingers" and "Crooked Souls" Oct 15 1923
"It" Nov 1 1923
"Bodies Piled Up" Nov 1 1923
"The Tenth Clew (or Clue)" Jan 1 1924
"Night Shots" Feb 1 1924
"Zigzags of Treachery" Mar 1 1924
"One Hour" Apr 1 1924
"The House in Turk Street" Apr 15 1924
"The Girl with the Silver Eyes" June 1924
"Women, Politics and Murder" Sept 1924
"The Golden Horseshoe" Nov 1924
"Who Killed Bob Teal?" Nov 1924
"Mike, Alec or Rufus?" Jan 1925
"The Whosis Kid" Mar 1925
"The Scorched Face" May 1925
"Corkscrew" Sept 1925
"Dead Yellow Women" Nov 1925
Come on back tomorrow for the rest.
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Pulp Gallery: THE CONTINENTAL OP (Part 2)
"The Gutting of Couffignal" Dec 1925
Here's the big finish to our galley of mags featuring the adventures of the Continental Op. All these but one (you can guess which) was borrowed from Galactic Central, HERE.
"Creeping Siamese" Mar 1926
"The Big Knockover" Feb 1927
"$106,000 Blood Money" May 1927
"The Main Death" June 1927
"The Cleansing of Poisonville" Nov 1927
"Crime Wanted - Male or Female" Dec 1927
"This King Business" Jan 1928
"Dynamite" Jan 1928
"The 19th Murder" Feb 1928
"Black Lives" Nov 1928
"The Hollow Temple" Dec 1928
"Black Honeymoon" Jan 1929-
"Black Riddle" Feb 1929
"Fly Paper" Aug 1929
"The Farewell Murder" Feb 1930
"Death and Company" Nov 1930
And yeah, I know this one doesn't really count, but what the hell.
"The Continental Opposite" May 2015
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More Pages to Explore .....
