Wed 18 Nov 2009
Capsule Reviews from TAD (1968), by Allen J. Hubin – Part 6.
Posted by Steve under Reviews[4] Comments
Commentary on books I’ve covered in the New York Times Book Review. [Reprinted from The Armchair Detective, Vol. 1, No. 4, July 1968.]
Previously on this blog:
Part 1 — Charlotte Armstrong through Jonathan Burke.
Part 2 — Victor Canning through Manning Coles.
Part 3 — Stephen Coulter through Thomas B. Dewey.
Part 4 — Charles Drummond through William Garner.
Part 5 — Richard H. Garvin through E. Richard Johnson.
HENRY KANE – Laughter in the Alehouse. Macmillan, hardcover, 1968. Paperback reprint: Penguin, 1978. McGregor, retired policeman, wealthy, a gourmet, erudite, sometimes (when so inclined) private detective, is a fascinating addition to mystery lore, and this his third case, involving a left over Nazi and a beautiful Israeli agent, is a solid, tightly plotted affair.
CARLTON KEITH – A Taste of Sangria. Doubleday Crime Club, hardcover, 1968. Paperback reprint: Curtis, n.d. Handwriting expert Jeff Green plays private investigator and comes up with some solid detection in this story of a disappearing (with $200,000) accountant.
PETER KINSLEY – Pimpernel 60. Michael Joseph, UK, hardcover, 1968; E. P. Dutton, US, hardcover, 1968. No paperback edition. A good example of what careful plotting and imaginative characterization can do for the novel of intrigue. This one follows a Jesuit priest in an attempt to bring a Russian defector out of Albania.
EMMA LATHEN – A Stitch in Time. Macmillan, hardcover, 1968. Paperback reprints include: Pyramid X-2018, 1969; Pocket, 1975. Pseudonymous Miss Lathen has yet to be unmasked, but she is reportedly two women writers. At any rate her (their) talents are indisputable, and this seventh of Wall Street banker John Putnam Thatcher’s cases is a nice puzzle in an interesting setting, told in witty, beautifully controlled prose.
Editorial Comments: Henry Kane was, of course, far better known as the author of several dozen private eye Peter Chambers mysteries. This is the last of three McGregor books. After 1968 Kane and Peter Chambers moved to Lancer Books, where he appeared in a series of novels that became more and more sexually explicit (that is to say, X-rated).
Carlton Keith wrote six mysteries, five with series character Jeff Green, of which Sangria is the last. I’ve always meant to read one of them, but so far, I still haven’t.
Pimpernel 60 is the only novel by Peter Kinsley that has appeared in the US. The other two, both published by Robert Hale, came out in the 1980s.
It seems strange today that an author could hide her real identities for as long as Emma Lathen did, apparently for as many as seven books. With all of the tools of the Internet available today, I think fans would have uncovered the truth in next to no time. For the record, Emma Lathen was the writing combo of Mary Jane Latsis and Martha Henissart. (You can probably put the pieces together.) They also wrote several mysteries as R. B. Dominic, a fact which as I recall, ace mystery reviewer Jon L. Breen brought to light.
November 18th, 2009 at 9:29 pm
After the low point of those soft core Peter Chambers books Kane made a comeback with the McGregor books which received excellent reviews overall, and if memory serves he had a genuine best seller before he left the field.
Emma Lathen more than deserves to be rediscovered and with all the banking finances in the news Thatcher would be a welcome voice of sanity. I don’t think I read any of the Dominic books though.
I recently found a box of Lathen’s books at a second hand book store and sent the doubles onto a friend who has become addicted to them. Is there anyone doing anything like this today?
November 18th, 2009 at 11:16 pm
David
No, the X-rated Lancer books in the early 1970s came after all three of the McGregor novels. But Kane did manage to create a new line of work for himself, switching to hardcover thrillers, as far as I can tell from the titles.
* -The Virility Factor (n.) McKay 1972
* Decision (n.) Dial 1973 [New York City, NY]
* -The Violator (n.) Warner 1974
* Lust of Power (n.) Atheneum 1975 [New York City, NY]
* The Tripoli Documents (n.) Simon 1976 [Middle East]
* The Little Red Phone (n.) Arbor 1982 [Maine]
Whether any of these are the bestseller you’re thinking of, I don’t know.
I can’t think of any other banker detectives still working today, but of course that doesn’t mean there aren’t any. All of the Lathen books that I’ve read have been well above average.
You’d like to think that someone might try reprinting them, but like so many authors no longer active, I don’t hold out much hope it’s going to happen. Martha Henissart is, I believe, is still with us, but if so, she’d be 80 this year.
November 18th, 2009 at 11:51 pm
I think The Tripoli Documents was a best seller, not New York Times, but still in that 100 K range. I know Kane was getting some good reviews and better sales than usual in that period.
I would have thought with the all the business and banking and economic news some bright fellow would have thought of reviving some of the Thatcher books with their background of economic skull duggery, but frankly the reason publishing is in such a doldrum is bright ideas seem pretty limited these days to trying to rip off Dan Brown, Harry Potter, and sexy vampires.
November 27th, 2009 at 10:36 pm
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