Thu 2 Aug 2012
GIL BREWER – The Red Scarf. Crest 310; paperback reprint, July 1959; cover art by Robert McGinnis. Hardcover: Mystery House, 1958. First published in Mercury Mystery Book-Magazine, November 1955 (probably abridged).
Gil Brewer was a prolific paperback writer in the 50s, 60s and 70s, as well as the author of many stories in Manhunt, Trapped, Guilty, Mike Shayne’s Mystery Magazine and other magazines in the same time period, including some western pulps. Only two of his books ever came out in hardcover, and this is one of them. (The other was The Angry Dream, also by Mystery House in 1957; reprinted in paperback by Zenith Books in 1958 as The Girl from Hateville.)
In its Crest edition, The Red Scarf is only 128 pages long, and even though the print is small, it can easily be read in less than a couple of hours. In fact, there are times when — I challenge you on this — your eyes will be going as fast as they can and whole paragraphs will be swallowed up in gulps — the pace is that intense.
There were many paperbacks novels in the 50s in which the male lead falls completely under the spell of a tempting woman and/or a briefcase full of money, and that’s exactly what this book is all about. Roy Nichols is the guy who needs the money for his failing Florida motel. Vivian is the girl who’s registered there with a bag full of mob money, tied up with a lucky red scarf. Bess is Roy’s wife, anxious to help, but with Roy not talking and Vivian holed up in cabin number six, she doesn’t know what to think.
Vivian’s partner in crime, thought dead, isn’t. Nor is the mob about to chalk off the missing money as operating expenses, and Gant, the local police detective, can’t figure out why Roy seems to be making up answers as he goes along.
Those are the ingredients. I’m sure you’re thinking you could put a pretty good story together and take over from here, and you probably could. Brewer does an ace-high job of it, though, and you can relax. You don’t have to.
I think the following excerpt, taken from pages 66-67, sums things up very nicely:
One way or another.
Even if I had to get hold of the brief case myself, and run … God, I was in a sweet mess and I knew it. But something had to be done.
You might quibble about some of the more unlikely aspects of the story afterwards, but I’m willing to wager that you’ll never think of them while you’re still turning the pages. For the price of a mere quarter (at the time, not today) you most assuredly got your money’s worth.
August 3rd, 2012 at 4:52 am
I’ve read a few of Brewer’s more lurid crime novels. THE VENGEFUL VIRGIN has quite a whopper of an ending. Nasty and cruel. PLAY IT HARD (reviewed here) has one of those “wrong man” motifs with impostors and a frame-up and a hero no one will believe… except his ex-girlfriend. Women tend to be thoroughly wicked and irresistibly sexual in Brewer’s books. 1960s versions of Phyllis Dietrichson, some even managing to exceed her villainy which is quite a feat, I think. Brewer was a great story teller with an often bleak view of the world filled with greedy souls no one could trust.
August 3rd, 2012 at 4:54 am
Looks like that link won’t work. If you want to read my review of PLAY IT HARD, you can cut and paste this one in your browser:
http://prettysinister.blogspot.com/2012/06/play-it-hard-gil-brewer.html
August 3rd, 2012 at 5:19 am
The link works nicely, J.F. !
The Doc
August 3rd, 2012 at 9:50 am
I think I used to have a few books by Gil Brewer. Did he write novelizations of a TV series at one time?
August 3rd, 2012 at 12:09 pm
JF
The second link works fine. I can investigate and see what went wrong with the first one, but it’s easier just to leave the second one there.
PLAY IT HARD was published by Monarch,, which weren’t distributed where I lived when I was growing up, so I’ve never read it. THE RED SCARF may be the first book by Brewer since I was in my teens, and as you can tell, I enjoyed it very much.
The only books by Brewer that I read back then, almost as soon as they came out were the ones put out by Gold Medal and (probably) Crest.
Titles such as 13 FRENCH STREET, SATAN IS A WOMAN, 77 RUE PARADIS, SO RICH SO DEAD, SOME MUST DIE and so on. Great wonderful stuff, immensely sexy and exciting for a kid in his teens.
All of the other books by Brewer I have were picked up used later on. I have a fairly complete collection of them, but I’ve yet to read any, perhaps for fear that they wouldn’t hold up to expectations. That and the fact that there simply too many books calling out to be read.
After reading THE RED SCARF, though, I promised myself to read more of them. Alas, so far I haven’t.
August 3rd, 2012 at 12:11 pm
“It Takes a Thief”, I think, was the TV show for which Brewer wrote tie-ins.
August 3rd, 2012 at 12:17 pm
Randy
As John links to in his review, Bill Pronzini did a profile on Brewer’s life and writing career on the primary Mystery*File website:
https://mysteryfile.com/GBrewer/FW.html
Be warned that it isn’t a very cheery story. Here’s a quote from early on in the article:
“You want to know what the life of a working mystery writer is really like? Gil Brewer could tell you. He could tell you about the taste of success and fame that never quite becomes a meal; the shattered dreams and lost hopes, the loneliness, the rejections and failures and empty promises, the lies and deceit, the bitterness, the self-doubts, the dry spells and dried-up markets, the constant and painful grubbing for enough money to make ends meet. He could tell you about all of that, and much more. He would, too, if he were still alive. But he isn’t.
“Gil Brewer drank himself to death on the second day of January, in the Year of Our Lord nineteen hundred and eighty-three, at the age of sixty.”
The real reason for providing the link is that following Bill’s piece there is a long and I think 99% complete bibliography for Brewer, including most of the sex novels he had to write at the end of his career to keep some money coming in.
But — to answer your question — you are correct. Brewer did three novelizations of the TV series IT TAKES A THIEF, the one starring Robert Wagner in the late 1960s.
August 6th, 2012 at 12:00 pm
Folks may be interested to know that the first-ever collection of Gil Brewer’s short stories, REDHEADS DIE QUICKLY AND OTHER STORIES, is coming out soon:
http://www.amazon.com/dp/0813044065/ref=tsm_1_fb_lk
It contains 25 stories from the 1950s:
With This Gun— (Detective Tales, March 1951)
It’s Always Too Late (Detective Fiction, April 1951)
Moonshine (Manhunt, March 1955)
My Lady Is a Tramp (Pursuit, May 1955)
Red Twilight (Hunted, October 1955)
Don’t Do That (Hunted, December 1955)
Die, Darling, Die (Justice, January 1956)
The Black Suitcase (Hunted, February 1956)
Shot (Manhunt, February 1956)
The Gesture (The Saint Detective Magazine, March 1956)
Home (Accused, March 1956)
Home-Again Blues (Pursuit, March 1956)
Mow the Green Grass (Pursuit, March 1956)
Come Across (Manhunt, April 1956)
Cut Bait (Pursuit, May 1956)
Matinee (Manhunt, October 1956)
The Axe Is Ready (Trapped, December 1956)
On a Sunday Afternoon (Manhunt, January 1957)
Prowler! (Manhunt, May 1957)
Bothered (Manhunt, July 1957)
Smelling Like a Rose (Mr., July 1957)
Death of a Prowler (Trapped, April 1958)
Getaway Money (Guilty, November 1958)
Redheads Die Quickly (Mystery Tales, April 1959)
Harlot House (Mystery Tales, August 1959)
I am this book’s editor, so naturally it would make me very happy if you gave it a look. Cheers!
August 6th, 2012 at 12:15 pm
David
Excellent, excellent news! Even though the book isn’t scheduled for release until late October, I’ve already put it in my Amazon shopping cart, and I hope everyone reading this will, too.
— Steve
August 6th, 2012 at 1:12 pm
Thanks, Steve!
August 6th, 2012 at 3:24 pm
I certainly will order it also. This collection is of great value and one that will help bring Brewer back into print. He deserves more recognition.
August 14th, 2012 at 12:57 pm
Gil Brewer’s short story collection! David, sometimes dreams do come true.
August 14th, 2012 at 3:08 pm
Your dream is my command! I’m currently working on a collection of stories that Brewer left unpublished.