Fri 18 Sep 2015
Reviewed by William F. Deeck: ROBERT AVERY – Murder on the Downbeat.
Posted by Steve under Authors , Bibliographies, Lists & Checklists , Reviews[5] Comments
William F. Deeck
ROBERT AVERY – Murder on the Downbeat. Arcadia House, hardcover, 1943. Death House #3, digest-sized paperback, 1944.
Clarinetist Steve Sisson is widely respected for his great jazz playing, but he has lots of enemies. Early one morning in Fat-Ankles’s joint during a jam session, one of those enemies shoots Sisson in the head with the working part of an ice pick.
The girlfriend of jazz columnist Malachy Bliss is arrested for file murder, she having had the opportunity and several good reasons for doing away with Sisson. Bliss, who is an even bigger toper than Jonathan Latimcr’s Bill Crane, begins his own investigation among musicians and the underworld.
After Avery has constructed a quite good, but perchance not accurate, simile — “as pure as a seminarian’s dream” — his inventiveness is exhausted. A typical Arcadia product: interesting background, poorly executed novel.
Bibliographic Notes: Robert Avery wrote three other mysteries, but all for the lending-library market. This seems to be Malachy Bliss’s only appearance, but two feature a sleuth named Joe Kelly, described by Bill elsewhere as a writer and amateur detective:
A Murder a Day! Mystery House, 1940. [Joe Kelly]
The Corpse in Company K. Swift, 1942. [Joe Kelly]
Murder on the Downbeat. Arcadia, 1943.
A Fast Man with a Dollar. Arcadia, 1947.
September 18th, 2015 at 3:12 pm
The murder victim in this being a musician last-named Sisson makes me wonder if he’s “related” to a certain 1940s comic book character. Swing Sisson was a big band leader/detective who appeared in 96 issues of Feature Comics, from 1941 to 1950. The character’s creation is credited to writer Robert Turner. Could that have been Robert Avery under another name?
September 18th, 2015 at 7:26 pm
That’s a good question, but other than their both using a character whose last name is Sisson, there doesn’t seem to be any other connection. Robert Turner was a prolific pulp writer who also dabbled in comics, and Robert Avery is that author’s real name. Two different guys. The comic book character’s name is an obvious play on words, referring of course to a jazz band’s “swing session.” What possessed Avery to use the same name, that is something I don’t have an answer to.
September 18th, 2015 at 9:07 pm
Steve – Thanks for clearing up my Avery-Turner question. Now I wonder if the two of them were acquainted, and Avery named his musician murder victim “Sisson” as a sly reference to his friend’s comic book character. A possibility that would be hard to verify at this point.
BTW, although I always got the pun, I never thought the name “Sisson” was very heroic-sounding for the two-fisted detective that Swing supposedly was. But maybe I’m being picky, since it didn’t prevent the character from having a nine-year run in a comic book; pretty good for the 1940s.
September 19th, 2015 at 1:56 am
Am I the only one curious how you shoot someone in the head with the working part of an icepick since shoving even long thin objects in the barrels of guns is on the suicidal side and it would be pretty inefficient from an air gun. Just how was this accomplished? Tiny crossbow?
Swing Sisson, alliteration carried to the extreme.
September 19th, 2015 at 4:54 pm
An air gun held up against the head? I have no idea — just asking.