Fri 13 Aug 2010
Reviewed by Dan Stumpf: JONATHAN GANT – Never Say No to a Killer.
Posted by Steve under Reviews[3] Comments
JONATHAN GANT – Never Say No to a Killer. Ace Double D-157, paperback original, 1956.
Someone on this blog recommended Never Say No to a Killer by Jonathan Gant, so when I found a copy cheap, I picked it up. And I’m glad I did.
This one owes a lot to Horace McCoy’s Kiss Tomorrow Goodbye, starting with a prison break, and hurtling the violent, amoral protagonist into near-control of illicit activities in a big city until he’s tripped up by…
Well, that would be telling too much, and while Never Say No speeds across the same ground as Kiss Tomorrow, it lacks the depth and vocabulary of Horace McCoy’s classic.
What it does offer is fast, slick writing and a pace that never falters. Worth checking out for fans of hard-boiled crime willing to waste a few hours enjoyably.
Editorial Comments: The “someone” who brought this book up earlier was Bill Crider, in of his columns on Gold Medal writers which he originally did for the print version of Mystery*File. The writer he discussed, though, was Clifton Adams, Jonathan Gant being a pen name he sometimes used. You can read the entire piece here on the blog.
The other half of this particular Ace Double paperback was Stab in the Dark, by Louis Trimble. Nothing by Trimble under his own name has been reviewed here on the blog, but I did one of Bring Back Her Body, which he wrote as by Stuart Brock. You can find it way back here.
August 13th, 2010 at 5:24 pm
While I generally prefer Adams westerns, I have this one and enjoyed it on the level that Dan describes. It reminded me a little of those late forties early fifties crime films where Edmond O’Brien or Barry Sullivan always seemed to be trying to take over some syndicate or other and getting their comeuppance — but just barely.
The Trimble isn’t bad either.
And these Ace crime and mystery doubles are generally still fun to collect. Not too hard to find, and often a good read when you do, with familiar names as well as some you might not expect. Granted some of the more collectible ones are pricey (William Burroughs JUNKIE for instance or Michael Morgan’s DECOY), but once in a while other Ace Doubles will still show up in a used book store or library sale. I don’t think I paid more than $2 for any of the ones in my collection. This one I picked up for 35 cents if memory serves.
It’s a nice attractive series to collect though.
August 13th, 2010 at 5:48 pm
In one of the very early issues of Mystery*File — I’m talking mid-70s — I compiled and published a complete list of Ace Double’s, but the mystery and crime fiction ones only.
I don’t think I included the Burroughs book, but I know I omitted some Ace did in the same format toward the end of the line with classic authors like Helen Reilly and Georges Simenon.
I didn’t think they belonged with the pulp-oriented authors the rest of the line had, but I took some flak for it, and I probably deserved it.
But I did get Donald A. Wollheim, the editor at Ace at the time to comment on the article.
Someday I’m going to look to see if I can’t find my copies of those early issues. The issues were small but significant — I think!
Other checklists that appeared in those early M*F’s were of the Dell 10c line of paperbacks and Mike Nevins sent me one of the Avon Murder Mystery Monthly books, the digest-sized paperbacks from the 40s.
August 29th, 2010 at 3:59 pm
[…] Speaking of wasting a few hours enjoyably, Harry Whittington was a cut above the average paperback hack, and Desert Stake-Out is a cut above the average Whittington. […]