Mon 20 Jan 2014
FREDRIC BROWN – The Murderers. Dutton, hardcover, 1961. Bantam J2587, paperback, 1963.
— Knock Three-One-Two. Dutton, hardcover, 1959.Bantam A2135, paperback, 1960.
I’ve had a couple Fredric Brown’s on my shelf since Hubin-knows-when, but when I glanced at the covers the other day I couldn’t for the life of me remember reading them.
The Murderers is pleasantly amoral right up to the cop-out ending. Two unemployed actors find their careers stymied by different adverse circumstances and decide to solve their problems by swapping murders. Everything goes along smoothy and even enjoyably until … well, as I aid, the ending’s a disappointment, but it doesn’t come until late in the book, which is mostly slick and much fun.
Knock Three-One-Two is just as contrived and just as enjoyable. Ray Fleck, the hero of the piece is a two-bit, two-timing, half-smart chiseler and gambling addict (though the term was unknown back then) looking to score the Big One that will wipe out his debts and get him back in the Game.
Knock is the account of his night-long unlucky odyssey to that elusive home, set against the backdrop of a city plagued by an elusive serial killer.
It’s something to the credit of Brown’s writing that the extraordinary contrivances of this thing don’t seem all that apparent until you set it down and start thinking about it.
SPOILER ALERT — PLOT DETAILS AHEAD!
Every bet that Ray makes he loses, every ploy he tries backfires, every turn he takes is wrong one, right up to the end, when he gets the chance to score several thousand dollars of insurance money — by steering the Serial Killer to his wife.
END OF WARNING.
The resolution is unsurprising, but Brown delivers the package neatly enough that it’s a pleasure reading it.
January 20th, 2014 at 9:30 pm
I know I’ll be repeating myself, but you can’t go wrong with Fredric Brown.
Having said that, I feel his forte was really the Short Story. As far as the novels go, my favorite is “The Far Cry”. And amazingly enough, I actually liked “The Fabulous Clipjoint” , being the first Ed and Am novel. Most people I know don’ t care for it at all. As for the shorts, try reading “Mostly Murder” and see if you don’ t agree with me as to the short format.
January 20th, 2014 at 10:53 pm
KNOCK THREE-ONE-TWO was the first Fredric Brown book I read and it knocked my teen-aged socks off. Like Paul, THE FAR CRY is my favorite of his mystery novels, although THE LIGHTS IN THE SKY ARE STARS, his SF crime novel, comes pretty close.
January 20th, 2014 at 11:36 pm
With me it was WHAT MAD UNIVERSE. Reading it in STARTLING STORIES as a kid influenced me a lot. I thought so much of it I loaned it to a girl I was dating in college and even she liked it!
Good news about his short fiction. All his SF has already been collected in a big collection but Haffner Press will soon be publishing all his mystery and crime short stories in two massive volumes. They can be pre-ordered at their website.
January 21st, 2014 at 10:43 am
Good news about Brown and Haffner Press, Walker!
January 21st, 2014 at 5:02 pm
This was adapted on Boris Karloff’s THRILLER with Joe Maross, Beverly Garland, Charles Aidman, and Warren Oates as Benny a man desperate for the police to believe his confession. John Kneubuhl adapted it and Herman Hoffman directed.
I seem to recall it as faithful to Brown, with a good performance by Maross in a rare leading role.
Even today reading Brown is like reading no one else who ever worked in the genre. His best stories manage to take place in the gritty real world and at the same time have an almost fantastical element to them.
Nice to know he’s in print yet again.