review of
Stefan R. Dziemianowicz, Robert Weinberg, & Martin H. Greenberg edited
Hard-Boiled Detectives
by tENTATIVELY, a cONVENIENCE - June 19; July 20-27, 2023
For the complete review go here: http://idioideo.pleintekst.nl/CriticH...

I really had fun reading this. I hearkened back to when I read things when I was 13 or so. There was just the simple pleasure of enjoying the imaginations & skill of the writers. The editors picked 23 stories that appeared in the lifetime of Dime Detective magazine. In the Introduction, it's discussed how detectives were depicted in fiction before the hard-boiled detectives came along:

"Educated and often independently wealthy, he had the leisure to train his intellect and took a dilletante's delight in the mental stimulation a mystery afforded—the more difficult the better. The enormous burden of apprehending master criminals and restoring the social order was to the traditional sleuth a matter of noblesse oblige. He did what was expected of a man of his unusual capabilities.

"The pulp magazines changed all that. Created in 1896 to provide the public with cheap reading material, pulps rapidly became the main source of popular fiction in the United States, proliferating and diversifying to satisfy every taste.

"Without a doubt, the most fertile pulp fiction genre was the mystery-detective field. Between 1915 and 1955 nearly two hundred mystery-detective magazines flooded the newstands." - p ix

"Un the majority of popular fiction types, the hard-boiled detective has a known birthday and place of origin: the June 1, 1923 issue of Black Mask, in which Carroll John Daly introduced Race Williams, the progenitor of all hard-boiled detectives. The story in which Williams made his debut, "The Knights of the Open Palm," pales in comparison to the countless imitations it spawned, but it laid the groundwork for what we recognize today as the hard-boiled genre. Williams is a rugged individualist, the only person in an entire town with the gumption to take on the Ku Klux Klan." - p x

Wow, I want to read that story. It's interesting partially b/c one of the actors most known for his hard-boiled roles, Humphrey Bogart, had his 1st leading role in a movie called "Black Legion" (1937) in wch he takes on a white supremacist terrorist group of the same name as the title, an actual group of the time.

The above quotes were taken from the introduction by Stefan Dziemianowicz & this intro was written in New York in 1991.

The 1st story, "Hell's Pay Check", by Frederick Nebel, already has one of the standard tropes of these stories in place:

"Strout pushed Blake back and said to Cardigan: "You come down to headquarters tomorrow."

" hell I will. If you want me to come to headquarters go get a warrant for my arrest. You got a lame tip somewhere, Strout, and you're trying to make me believe that it's red hot. At your age you should know better than to try that one. It was whiskered before I was born."" - p 9

On to Carroll John Daly's "Crime Machine" & the character of the informer:

"The claw fingers opened and closed long after Irving Small placed the lamp back on the table. He stretched out his right hand and took something from the right hand of Vee Brown. For a few minutes his back was to me. He was counting softly to himself. The he spoke over his shoulder. "It ain't more than last time. Regan's worth more than that. It ain't very much."

""It's better than a cold, damp cell."

"Ehe—but not worth the price of a long box."

"Another moment of silence, and Irving Small spoke again. "He's a desperate man. I hope you left nothing behind to—that tells ill of me."

""Nothing. You've had my word on that."

""Ehe—I've had that.." The lips smacked again—and then, "He's at Magna's. Second floor—last room—over the pianie. This is the night for it. He'll leave tomorrow. Magna's is watched. If you hold a police parade there'll be no show."

""There'll be no parade," said Vee Brown." - p 28

Still in the same story the reader reaches the description of certain facial features as indicative of a certain type of personality. I wonder how long this type of typecasting has been going on & if it grew out of any particular system, such as phrenology.

"We turned and faced him. Certainly if I didn't know fear before, I knew it now. Rat- eyes, dominant chin and coarse, evil lips. There wasn't one redeeming feature in that hard, mean face." - p 32

There you have it, the murderer, can't have a story w/o one.

Erle Stanley Gardner's "The Hand of Horror" introduced an idea I don't recall encountering before: a palm-reading detective.

"Sampsel took out the paper from beneath the hand. It was a single sheet of note paper, upon which a message had been printed, in pencil, and the lettering was sufficiently crude to make it appear that the person who had written the message had been inclined to make an attempt to disguise his hand writing.

"FOR GOD'S SAKE SAY NOTHING TO THE POLICE.
OTHERWISE I WILL LOSE MY LIFE!

"Sampsel stared at the scrawled message on the piece of paper, then read it aloud to his secretary.

""You mean that was written by the woman whose hand is in that box?" she asked.

"Sampsel shook his head slowly. "No," he said, "I think it was written by the party who cut off the hand and put it in the box. It looks a young woman's handwriting, despite that an obvious attempt has been at disguising the salient characteristics."" - p 38

Sampsel the Seer, the palm-reading detective, explains some of what he can determine from a palm:

"There are certain lines of temeprament shown in the hand; certain dangerous tendencies on the part of an individual. Sometimes, by a proper warning, coupled with an exercise of the will, those tendencies can be avoided. If an intelligent attempt is not made, the tendencies are not avoided, and there is future disaster indicated. In the hand which I examined, there were such tendencies.["]" - pp 42-43

Who was the woman whose hand was severed?

""I am going to show you," said Doctor Moffat slowly, "a file of private records, a case history of something that is so weird and so bizarre, I have never previously mentioned it to anyone. I am going to show you the case notes of a dead woman who did not die."" - p 48

Moffat has what turns out to be an assistant who's deranged. Sampsel plays along w/ him to see what will happen:

"Sampsel continued making the buzzing noises with his tongue. He turned, arms still extended, and caught the flash of motion as the hunchback sprang for him.

"Sampsel felt the fangs of the hunchback at the back of his neck. He sank to the floor, the hunchback on top of him. He could feel the heat of the foul breath on his neck, could sense the feverish glitter of the staring eyes. Then Sampsel struggled for a minute, and lay still.

[..]

"THE HUNCHBACK STRAIGHTENED, crooning to himself: "I'm a spider. I'm a spider. Human flies come to my net and I suck out their life blood."

"Then he circled long arms about Sampsel's body. He lifted his motionless burden, and carried it as easily as though his victim had been a child." - p 59

On to the beginning of Max Brand's "Nine Parts Devil":

"EACH OF THE DUMBBELLS weighed fifty pounds. Imagine a filled six-galloon pail. That was the burden which Clovelly shifted in each hand. He had finished the shadow-boxing and the skipping of the rope, together with exercises to develop speed and elasticity. Uncle Henry always had advocated slow, heavy movements which built muscle into a great bulk." - p 65

The detective, Tolan, is cynically suspicious of the charms of a young woman:

""Put on the brakes," urged Tolan. "This kid is a floozie with a Hollywood look and a marble front. She may be working a double-cross for all I know. What I don't is that she won't take the two of us to Al Champion. She'll show you the way, but she won't show anybody else. Sound her out, Mr. Clovelly. She's hard enough to bust a diamond drill; but I'll be there to help you along."

[..]

"CLOVELLY COULD HARDLY WAIT to usher Tolan before him into the reception room where Parker, the second man, stood almost invisible against the stiff downward sweep of the great curtains. He stood on guard, as it were, over a slender girl in a flowery spring dress and a very dainty blue hat. She stood up with a smile so pleasant and with eyes so big, so brown, so gentle, that Clovelly knew at once that he could believe whetever she said. The doubt which Tolan had expressed about her was a brutal comment on Tolan himself, not upon this charming girl." - p 69

My reviewer's note to myself regarding tne next passage is somewhat ambiguous to me, "unsatisfactory". I assume it means that I found this ending unsatsifactory:

"He knew that, for her, the dread of the future had not ended; they merely had passed another milestone on a journey, the final destination of which was unknown." - p 91

John Lawrence's "A Burial Is Arranged":

"I gave up trying to speculate on how he might enter the building. That was no concern of mine. If he entered the office—

"I hefted my gun, my jaw hard. I sent quick glances around for a place to stow myself. The couch looked best. It was sunk in a patch of deepest shadow, its high ends would effectually screen me from the opening door.

"Also, it commanded a full view of the safe—or, at least, of the black outline of the safe. I slipped quickly over to the huge deep-seated leather piece, groped for the high end of it, turned and eased myself down into the corner further from the door.

"I sat on a man's face." - p 107

Surprise, surprise! I thought that was a lovely little way to write the reader into a murder. But let's have some action, shall we? Enuf of these still lives:

"I slid up the window, fixed the catch for the fourth time halfway open. I climbed out, sweat running down me in streams, got my feet on the six-inch ledge, knelt till I could get one groping hand up to the scroll-work above, heaved myself erect, trembling.

"It was an almost inaudible job to slam the window down, but as I did, I heard the click of the lock shooting into place.

"There I hung, literally, by toes and fingers, with the wind whistling about me, and the dread certainty that if I were discovered, I faced my ultimate, indisputable finish." - pp 115-116

We reach in cognito in William E. Barrett's "A Man's Last Hours":

"He wore the regulation dinner jacket, and there was nothing to make him apart from other men or to make him remembered. He preferred it that. If once he attracted too much attention, he was through.

"There were men placed at his wheel who would kill him within twenty-four hours if they knew his real identity." - p 123

&, then, the hired assassin:

""What's your racket?"

""Musician, once."

"There wasn't any need to throw a question beyond that. It was too apparent what the man was today. He was a deathly sick, whipped dog. Culver had hit upon a theory in the split seconds between the moment when he noticed the gun under the napkin and the moment when he dove for it. He hadn't changed that theory since. Now he cracked it, his hard, direct stare fixed on Benny Pond's pale face.

""Somebody hired you to shoot Menger," he said. "Probably fixed it for your family to get the money. Sold you the idea that you wouldn't live to take the rap. Right?"

"Benny Pond stared sullenly at the table-top. He didn't attempt to answer.

"Culver guessed again. "You've got a wife and kids, haven't you?"" - p 128

Norbert Davis, "Something for the Sweeper":

""I mean, did you think he broke some windows, he usually does?"

""He makes a habit of breaking windows?"

"She nodded. "Oh yes. But only plate glass ones."

""Particular, huh? What does he break windows for?"

"Her sallow face flushed slightly. "He sees his image. You know, his reflection. And he thinks he is following himself again. He thinks he is spying on himself. And so he breaks the windows."

""Well, maybe it's a good idea," said Jones. "Is he ever troubled with pink elephants?"

""Yes, he is. He often sees them walking on the ceiling when he wakes up in the morning."" - pp 132-133

But what about the detective's feet?, you ask.

""Sarah," said Morganwaite. "I can't believe it. I can't think she'd do that."

""People do," said Jones. He stretched his feet out on the stairs, grunting painfully. "Chilblains—I get 'em every spring. They're killing me. Ever have 'em?"

""No," said Morganwaite." - p 140

D. L. Champion's "Footprints on a Brain" presents us w/ a detective who's a malevolent manipulator.

""Well," he bellowed again, "why don't you make a move? Why don't you get your own butts. You ain't a cripple. Are you?"

"Alhoff's ghastly smile grew broader, more horrible. Slowly he pushed his chair away from the desk. When he spoke his voice was frozen honey.

""You have come to the crux of the matter, Sergeant," he said softly. "And I'm afraid I must correct you. I am a cripple."

"Corrigan stared down at the chair in which Alhoff sat. He looked foolishly at the two stumps which ended Alhoff's body where his legs should have begun." - p 145

Alhoff, despite his limitations & his viciousness, nonetheless manages to DETECT:

""And the manuscript?"

""Was on the desk in front of him. The last chapter was written. Apparently, he had completed the book."

""Where is it now?"

"Corrigan plucked the large manila envelope from under his arm. "Here," he said.

"Alhoff took it and placed it on the desk. He nodded his head slowly and assumed an expression that he'd swiped from Warner Oland in the movies. I grinned at him.

""All right, Inspector," I said. "Who do I arrest?"" - p 151

That story was written in 1938 when, I reckon, just about any American reader wd've recognized the reference to Warner Oland, the actor perhaps most associated w/ his playing of Charlie Chan in the movies. I made a movie about him:

402. "CHAN(geling)"
- a media analysis of yellowface in Warner Oland movies by tENTATIVELY, a cONVENIENCE
- made from January to February, 2014
- edit finished on February 21, 2014
- 30:05
- on my onesownthoughts YouTube channel here: https://youtu.be/XMP8mU1OfSY

On to Raymond Chandler's short story version of "Lady in the Lake":

"I WAS BREAKING a new pair of shoes in on my desk that morning when Violets M'Gee called me up. It was a dull hot damp August day and you couldn't keep your neck dry with a bath towel.

""How's the boy?" Violets began, as usual. "No business in a week, huh? There's a guy named Howard Melton over in the Avenent Building lost track of his wife. He's district manager for the Doreme Cosmetic Company. He don't want to give it to Missing Persons for some reason. The boss knows him a little. Better get over there, and take your shoes off before you go in. It's a pretty snooty outfit."

"Violets M'Gee is a homicide dick in the sherriff's office, and if it wasn't for all the charity jobs he gives me, I might be able to make a living. This looked a little different, so I put my feet on the floor and swabbed the back of my neck again and went over there." - p 165

I might as well contrast that to the beginning of the novel, eh?! I mean, who's gonne try to stop me? YOU! Tough Guy?! Don't make me laugh! I mean I just had an appendectomy & the stitches might rip.

"The Treloar Building was, and is, on Olive Street, near Sixth, on the west side. The sidewalk in front of it had been built of black and white rubber blocks. They were taking them up now to give to the government, and a hatless pale man with a face a building superintendent was watching the work and looking as if it was breaking his heart." - p 1, FIRST SIGNET BOOKS EDITION, September 1976

Let that be a lesson to you. Gotta love this Chandler guy, whoever HE is, for his great descriptions:

"I MADE SAN BERNARDINO in less than two hours and for once in its life it was almost as cool as Los Angeles, and not nearly so sticky. I took on a cup of coffee and bought a pint of rye and gassed up and started the grade. It was overcast all the way to Bubbling Springs. Then it suddenly got dry and bright and cool air blew down the gorges, and I finally came to the big dam and looked along the level blue reaches of Puma Lake. Canoes paddled on it, and rowboats with outboard motors and speedboats churned up the water and made a lot of fuss over nothing. Jounced around in their wake, people who had paid two dollars for a fishing license wasted their time trying to catch a dime's worth of fish.

"The road turned two ways from the dam. My way was the south shore. It skimmed along high among piled-up masses of granite. Hundred-foot yellow pines probed at the clear blue sky. In the open spaces grew bright green manzanita and what was left of the wild irises and white and purple lupine and bugle flowers and desert paint brush. The road dropped to the lake level and I began to pass flocks of camps and flocks of girls in shorts on moto-scooters, walking all over the highway, or just sitting under trees and showing off their legs. I saw enough beef on the hoof to stock a cattle ranch." - p 176

Whew! He crammed alot into those 2 paragraphs. He meets the local all-for-the-price-of-one official. One might mistakenly believe he's a country bumpkin. Don't be fooled.

"A LARGE WHITE CARD in the window, printed in heavy block capitals, said: Keep Tinchfield Constable. Behind the window was a narrow counter with piles of dusty folders on it. The door was glass and lettered in black paint. Chief of Police. Fire Chief. Town Constable. Chamber of Commerce. Enter.

"I entered and was in what was nothing but a small one-room pineboard shack with a potbellied stove in the corner, a littered rolltop desk, two hard chairs and the counter. On the wall hung a large blueprint map of the district, a calendar, a thermometer. Beside the desk telephone numbers had been written laboriously on the wood in large deeply bitten figures.

For the complete review go here: http://idioideo.pleintekst.nl/CriticH... Jeff Hobbs1,043 28 Want to read

Read so far:

*Hell's Paycheck/Frederick Nebel
*The Crime Machine/Carroll John Daly
The Hand of Horror/Erle Stanley Gardner
*Nine Parts Devil/Max Brand
A Burial Is Arranged/John Lawrence
*A Man's Last Hours/William E. Barrett
Something for the Sweeper/Norbert Davis --3
Footprints on a Brain/DL Champion
*The Lady in the Lake/Raymond Chandler
*Strangler's Kill/Merle Constiner
*Ding Dong Belle/Hugh B. Cave
*You Slay Me, Baby/Frederick C. Davis
*Sleep No More, My Lovely/GT Fleming-Roberts
*I'll Slay You in My Dreams/Bruno Fischer
No Minimum for Murder/Julius Long
*A Ghoul and His Money/CM Kornbluth
Cold Storage/Robert Turner
Death Comes Gift-wrapped/William P. McGivern --2
*A Dish of Homicide/Hank Searls
Safe As Any Sap/William Tenn
*None But the Lethal Heart/William C. Gault
The Man from Limbo/John D. MacDonald
Murderer's Encore/Murray Leinsteranthologies available-at-ia Crista139

Really enjoyed this collection of short stories and I particularly d that it was chronological. Writing styles were nuanced so subtly that it was a challenge to distinguish the passage of nearly 2 decades in the cover-to-cover read. The mid 40s trudged a bit, but I was pleasantly surprised by some of the authors I’d never read before, and added them to my reading list. Raymond Chandler, of course, shone. The final story was also one my my favorites, with hints of Poe; I’ll say no more there. Overall, a bargain buy at my local library clearing-house sale that has earned a permanent spot on my bookshelf. Frank JudeAuthor 3 books47

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