Fri 13 Mar 2026
Diary PI Mystery Review: MICHAEL COLLINS – Act of Fear.
Posted by Steve under Uncategorized[8] Comments
MICHAEL COLLINS – Act of Fear. Dan Fortune #1. Dodd Mead, hardcover, 1967. Bantam, paperback; 1st printing, April 1969. Playboy Press, paperback, 1980.
Introducing PI Dan Fortune, the book being the winner of an Edgar by the MWA for Best First Novel. Partly autobiographical in nature, with Fortune’s own insights into people and the world. He has only one arm and wavers between the worst of society and those who at least live honestly and lawfully. Chelsea, the area of New York City to which he has returned, is not quite sure of him, for he has left them before. Fortune asks many questions of life, He also has some answers, so he keeps asking.
Helping the friend of a boy who has disappeared puts the kid in more danger than before, and Fortune must intercede in a local mobster’s affairs to solve a couple of murders, Pressures from the boy’s miserable family matter less.
Included are sad pictures of what people like and what they have to settle for, The case is broken by the realization it is not what is true that matters, but what people think is true.
Rating: ****½
March 13th, 2026 at 9:55 pm
Bill Crider also reviewed this book. He liked it, too. Here’s the link:
https://mysteryfile.com/blog/?p=74037
March 15th, 2026 at 12:23 am
I recall reading this very addition, the beginning of a long pleasurable association with Lynds and Dan Fortune.
March 15th, 2026 at 4:52 pm
All I remember is this McGruber [snl mgyver parody] like scene where Fortune finds out a couple of hitmen are gunning for the kid’s hideout. Fortune gets there first—but instead of getting out of there before the killers come, he decides to give the kid a long boring lecture on the meaning of life. By the time he finishes his sermon, the killers have arrived.
March 15th, 2026 at 5:11 pm
Not so much in this case, but I do recall Lynds being even more opinionated, let’s say, as the series went on.
For a long excellent overview of Lynds’ writing career, go to the following essay by Ed Lynsky on the primary M*F website:
https://mysteryfile.com/Lynds/Collins.html
It’s followed by an interview Ed did with him shortly before his death.
March 16th, 2026 at 3:09 pm
Bought it off a GC Murphy paperback rack in 1969 with Richard Stark’s THE SOUR LEMON SCORE and Ross Macdonald’s THE INSTANT ENEMY. Total cost $1.80 plus tax. Those were the days, my friends, we thought they’d never end!
March 16th, 2026 at 9:49 pm
If I offered a prize for Comment of the Year, Fred, you’d win it, hands down. (And it’s only March.)
March 17th, 2026 at 11:14 am
Fred Blosser deserves acclaim for COMMENT OF THE YEAR! Like David Vineyard, I’ve read many Dan Fortune mysteries and enjoyed them all.
March 21st, 2026 at 1:33 am
Obviously that should be edition instead of addition, I’ll blame a typo and Auto-Correct.
As the Fortune/Collins series went on the books gained in critical attention and were even mentioned in the same breath as Ross Macdonald and Archer, I imagine that had something to do with them becoming a bit more talky and lecture bound.
I confess I found some of the books and Fortune himself a bit less appealing later on.