A REVIEW BY RAY O’LEARY:
   

M. V. HEBERDEN – Murder of a Stuffed Shirt. Doubleday Crime Club, hardcover, 1944.

M. V. HEBERDEN Murder of a Stuffed Shirt

   Desmond Shannon, a big redheaded PI in the Mike Shayne mode, gets back to his New York office after doing some Intelligence Work during World War II and suddenly finds himself a very popular fellow: Wealthy Theodore Armisted has just been murdered, after tipping the FBI off about an organized Draft Evasion Ring. The FBI and local Police want Shannon in on the case, and so do Armisted’s surviving relatives, who hire him to investigate.

   Problem is, one of the suspects saved Shannon’s life years ago in South America, and Shannon is determined that, guilty or innocent, he will not be charged with the crime… Which is gonna call for some astute detective work on his part or some tricky writing on Heberden’s.

   Due to the wartime paper shortage, this was published in a hardback edition barely larger than a paperback, and though the title sounds like a Classical Puzzle Novel, this is actually a Hard-Boiled PI yarn. And — thanks to some snappy dialogue — a passable read.

       Previously on this blog:

Mystery Woman.
Reviewed by William F. Deeck:   CHARLES L. LEONARD – Deadline for Destruction.
Archived Review by Steve Lewis:   CHARLES L. LEONARD – Sinister Shelter.