Sat 5 Jul 2025
BARRY FANTONI – Mike Dime. Mike Dime #1. Hodder & Stoughton, UK, hardcover, 1980. Sphere, UK, 1982. Franklin Watts, US, hardcover, 1980.
In 1948 the two leading detective pulp fiction magazines were Black Mask and Dime Detective Magazine, probably in that order, Neither, alas, is around today, but Black Mask it was which provided the birthplace and main stomping ground for all the great private detective heroes of the 1920’s and 1930’s. And from Dime Detective comes the name of Barry Fantoni’s new detective hero, Mike Dime, and he’s a private eye. What else?
In Mike Dime the novel, Fantoni does his best to recreate the world and atmosphere of the year 1948. The city is Philadelphia, and Harry Truman has just pulled off his surprising upset victory over Tom Dewey.
But 1948 was a long while after Dashiell Hammett had quit writing, and Raymond Chandler had long since been swallowed up by Hollywood. In their wake, all the wise-cracking imitators had taken over, and Mike Dime, the detective, manages to place no higher than in the midst of these, most of whom — anybody remember Rex McBride? – -are forgotten today.
It’s not because Barry Fantoni hails from England. He has the local lingo down pat, and historically all his people and places are exactly right. Dime, who is hired first to protect a bagful of money and then to help a girl with a blackmailer problem, is grubby but honest.
His greatest problem is rather that, as Fantoni attempts to develop a sense of the comedic as well as the dramatic, in what are obviously intended to be the lighter moments, the result, twice at least, is outrageously silly slapstick instead.
It’s fun to read, in a way, but unfortunately what it also does is to remind us that this is the sort of private eye caper which is nothing more than a make-believe fairy tale, with beautiful women falling willy-nilly, for example, all over the feet of the invincible hero, who comes complete with dirty socks and a three-day old beard .
It is the story of a dream, a fantasy, one that doesn’t exist, and as Fantoni inadvertently reminds us, except in the world of fiction, it never really did. This book has its heart in the right spot, but its world is built on a faulty foundation.
Rating: C
NOTE: A second and final book in the Mike Dime series was Stickman (1982). There were also two short stories: “Hopper and Pink” (New Crimes, 1989) and “Holy Smoke” (New Crimes 2, 1990).
July 5th, 2025 at 1:57 pm
Barry Fantoni, who passed away earlier this year, was far more well known in England than in this country.
His Wikipage is here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barry_Fantoni
This is the first paragraph, which does not mention Mike Dime the character, nor the books:
“Barry Ernest Fantoni (28 February 1940 – 20 May 2025) was a British author, cartoonist and jazz musician, most famous for his work with the magazine Private Eye, for whom he also created Neasden F.C. He had also published books on Chinese astrology as well as a mystery novel set in Miami featuring 87-year-old private investigator Harry Lipkin.”
July 6th, 2025 at 10:56 am
I remember being equally disappointed with Mike Dime but also that I read and enjoyed the second and last in the series, Stickman.
For what it’s worth here’s a brief review of Stickman that I wrote in 1990.
Barry Fantoni: Stickman
I hadn’t much cared for Fantoni’s earlier Mike Dime, but I enjoyed this second tale about the 1940’s Philadelphia p.i.. He is hired to investigate the apparent framing for murder of a night club drummer, the titular stickman. All the clichés of the private eye story are here but they are nicely handled. The tone is tongue in cheek, but not silly. The ending relies on a deux-ex-machina and not all the loose ends are tied up, but this is in common with much of the genre. Perhaps I misjudged the original when I read it, for this had me regretting there wasn’t a third to read. (CT 27)
July 6th, 2025 at 11:00 pm
STICKMAN, alas, has never been published in the US. Inexpensive copies are available from around the rest of the world, but shipping costs are often more than for the book itself.
Or in other words, I’ve never read it, lame excuse and all.
I wonder if I still have my copy of MIKE DIME. It sounds like it really ought to be my kind of book. I’m ready to give it another try.
July 6th, 2025 at 11:04 pm
Steve,
Speaking of reading obscure works…?
July 6th, 2025 at 11:28 pm
Yes, I know. Pure bravado. I’ve read only one full-length novel all year. Trying to do better!
July 12th, 2025 at 12:21 am
It’s not enough to recreate the milieu, the tone, voice, and atmosphere have to match as well and then in a modern work there has to be something worth saying that didn’t get said at the time, or perhaps just didn’t get said loud enough. Good pastiche should not only mimic the original, but subtly say something about it too or take it somewhere the original did not.