ELIZABETH IRONSIDE – The Art of Deception. Felony & Mayhem Press, 1st US edition, softcover, 2009. Originally published in England by Hodder & Stoughton, hardcover, 1998.

   I can’t help but begin with the American publishers’ statement that the books they publish in the “British” category “feature the highly literate, often witty prose that fans of British mystery demand.”

   I hadn’t realized that this was why I read a fairly substantial number of British mysteries, but I will preen my feathers discreetly, trying to pretend that I’m not flattered by the claim.

   To give you some idea of author’s style, here are the opening lines:

   The first-person narrator of this archly comic mystery is Nicholas Ochterlonie, a prim art historian who, suddenly abandoned by his wife, finds himself afloat on a sea of uncertainty. The comforting, safe harbor he thinks he finds in his neighbor, the beautiful and mysterious Julian Bennet, instead turns out to be the beginning of a perilous voyage.

   It’s initially one of discovery, with the often remote yet sometimes passionate Julian alternately exciting and perversely frightening him. The trashing of Julian’s flat by vandals and a street mugging introduce dark notes into the world he marginally shares with her, and her friends, Russians of dubious background, he only tolerates because he hopes they will bring him closer to an understanding of the enigma that she remains to him.

   There’s deception at every level in this artful novel. Nicholas is, of course, undoubtedly deceiving himself as he is deceived by Julian, but prodded by his cousin Prisca at the opening dinner, the novel is his attempt to follow her advice to “come to some kind of understanding of what happened, why it happened, why it happened to you of all people.”

   The reader floats on a surface of contradictions and improbable events, with the novel, in search of explanations, ending with the narrator’s declaration that he will “never tell [Prisca] or anyone” what they want to know.

   And if you are interested in learning more about the the multiple deceptions, I invite you to enter this maze, perhaps at your own peril.

   Bio-Bibliography:

      A Very Private Enterprise (1984)
      The Accomplice (1995)
      Death in the Garden (1995)

      The Art of Deception (1998)
      A Good Death (2000)

   Elizabeth Ironside is/was the pen name of Lady Catherine Manning, wife of Sir David Manning, the British ambassador to the US between 2003 and 2007. Felony & Mayhem Press has recently reprinted all five books, in each case their first US publication.

THE ARIZONIAN. RKO Radio Pictures, 1935. Richard Dix, Margot Grahame, Preston Foster, Louis Calhern, James Bush, J. Farrell MacDonald, Willie Best, Etta McDaniel. Director: Charles Vidor.

   The ruggedly handsome Richard Dix, the actor whose voice you could recognize at a hundred paces, maybe even a thousand, was – and I’d never realized it until watching The Arizonian a couple of evenings ago – an occasional but fairly popular western star in the 1930s and 40s.

   He was the star of Cimarron (1931) for example; he was in this movie, of course; and he played Wild Bill Hickok in Badlands of Dakota (1941) and Wyatt Earp in Tombstone: The Town Too Tough to Die (1942).

   But unless you can tell me otherwise, most of his films were B-movies, where I think his good looks and great voice were underutilized, if not wasted. Regarding his voice, and I promise I won’t bring it up again, his career in the movies in the 1920s was extensive, and in the silents, all he had was his looks and (in my opinion) some acting ability.

   Dix plays Clay Tallant in The Arizonian, the Good Guy who comes to town, a town run by a crooked sheriff – there is a marshal (J. Farrell MacDonald), but he (the marshal) lasts about a minute and a half in terms of on-screen time.

   Clay is tempted into staying on by the beauty of singer Kitty Rivers (Margot Grahame), not realizing that his brother, already in town, is deeply in love with her. Brought in by the sheriff (crooked, if you recall, and played to perfection by a nicely supercilious Louis Calhern) is notorious outlaw Tex Randolph (Preston Foster), who soon changes sides when he sees who he’s been brought into town to kill.

   All the right ingredients for a pretty good western, and a beautifully photographed one to boot, but that’s all it is, pretty good. There’s a noticeable lack of continuity between scenes — or jumps in the story line, to make myself clearer — that I found annoying. Not a matter serious enough to stop watching, but nonetheless … annoying.

   There is a terrific shootout at the corral at the end of town, though, one with few survivors left standing, and one which made me bring the back of my right hand to my forehead with enough force behind it to make me say Duh. Mostly to myself, but now you know too.

DESMOND BAGLEY – Flyaway. Doubleday, US, hardcover, 1979; Fawcett, paperback, 1980. British editions: Collins Crime Club, hc, 1978. Fontana, paperback, 1979. Reprinted many times since, in both hardcover and soft.

   Picking the best Desmond Bagley high-adventure novel is difficult because they are of uniformly high quality; most critics agree that in the past ten years, Bagley has surpassed the old masters such as Hammond Innes and Alistair MacLean with such expert novels as The Vivero Letter (1968), set in the remote Mexican jungle; The Snow Tiger (1974), a tale of an avalanche in the mountains of New Zealand’s South Island; and The Enemy (1978), which deals with computer technology.

   Bagley’s novels mix carefully researched background detail with a great deal of action and momentum, involving his reader thoroughly in his adventurous plots.

   Flyaway may be Bagley’s finest work, a slight cut above the others. When Paul Billson disappears into the Sahara Desert, aircraft-industry security chief Max Stafford departs London for Africa to track Billson down. Max learns that Billson, whose father was a legendary there some decades ago, intends to clear the Billson name; the public still believes Billson’s father deliberately vanished over the Sahara so his wife could collect a fortune in insurance benefits.

   Max catches up with Billson — after much difficulty — but then both men find themselves hunted by forces intent on protecting the secret of Billson Sr.’s disappearance.

   This novel is superior high adventure; Bagley’s attention to technical detail and his evocation of the desert milieu are impeccable. Bagley drew upon personal experience in the aircraft industry for this novel, which gives it added substance and credibility.

         ———
   Reprinted with permission from 1001 Midnights, edited by Bill Pronzini & Marcia Muller and published by The Battered Silicon Dispatch Box, 2007.   Copyright © 1986, 2007 by the Pronzini-Muller Family Trust.

Editorial Comment:   Included in Mike Ripley’s list of favorite thrillers was Desmond Bagley’s High Citadel, while David Vineyard, in his Century of Thrillers list suggested either High Citadel, once again, or Running Blind as high points in Bagley’s career.

THE CISCO KID WESTERN COLLECTION:

        ● THE GAY CAVALIER. Monogram Pictures, 1946. Gilbert Roland, Martin Garralaga, Nacho Galindo, Ramsay Ames, Helen Gerald, Tristram Coffin. Director: Willliam Nigh.

       â— BEAUTY AND THE BANDIT. Monogram Pictures, 1946. Gilbert Roland, Martin Garralaga, Frank Yaconelli, Ramsay Ames, Vida Aldana. Director: William Nigh.

       ● SOUTH OF MONTEREY. Monogram Pictures, 1946. Gilbert Roland, Martin Garralaga, Frank Yaconelli, Marjorie Riordan, Iris Flores. Director: William Nigh.

        ● RIDING THE CALIFORNIA TRAIL. Monogram Pictures, 1947. Gilbert Roland, Martin Garralaga, Frank Yaconelli, Teala Loring, Inez Cooper. Director: William Nigh

        ● ROBIN HOOD OF MONTEREY. Monogram Pictures, 1947. Gilbert Roland, Chris Pin Martin, Evelyn Brent, Jack La Rue, Pedro DeCordoba, Donna DeMario. Director: Christy Cabanne.

        ● KING OF THE BANDITS. Monogram Pictures, 1947. Gilbert Roland, Angela Greene, Chris Pin Martin, Anthony Warde, Laura Treadwell, William Bakewell. Director: Christy Cabanne.

   Speaking of Gilbert Roland and Widely Available (as I was at the end of my previous review ), his six Cisco Kid movies from Monogram are out on DVD in pristine prints not seen since their original release. This is not, however, a cause for general rejoicing, as the films themselves could be charitably described as lack-luster.

   Gilbert Roland was a romantic leading man in the silent films, but despite his melodious voice and relaxed acting, he slipped badly in the 30s and 40s: he can be glimpsed in humiliatingly small parts in The Sea Hawk (1940) and My Life with Caroline (1941) and he landed in a Columbia serial, The Desert Hawk in ’44.

   In 1949 John Huston resurrected his fortunes with a meaty part in We Were Strangers that led to a satisfying career as a busy character actor, but in 1946 he was doing pretty much anything that came along — and doing it surprisingly well.

   Roland’s Cisco Kid movies have their moments, but they are mostly listless and formulaic. Action is scarce and rather routine (except for a couple of sword fights in The Gay Cavalier and Riding the California Trail) and as for formula, well, in Cavalier Martin Garralaga plays an impecunious rancher who wants to wipe out his debts by marrying his daughter to a shifty Americano. It is up to Cisco to rescue her.

   In California Trail, Garralaga plays a rancher in debt to bad guys who wants to absolve his debt by marrying off his niece to a Yankee ne’er-do-well. And in South of Monterey, he’s a Police Captain who owes his job to American bad-guy Harry Woods and pressures his sister to marry him.

   Okay, so there’s a lot of bland-and-predictable in these films, but they are saved, redeemed even, by Gilbert Roland’s swaggering, sexy portrayal of the Cisco Kid. Roland, the only Mexican actor to play Cisco, wrote some of his own dialogue for these films, which demonstrates how seriously he took the part.

   His macho swagger and general air of devil-may-care recall Doug Fairbanks in The Gaucho (1927) and even in the reduced circumstances of these poverty-row westerns he looks relaxed, expansive, and damn sexy — which isn’t easy in a B-movie.

   Errol Flynn and Clark Gable projected rugged male sexiness easily with the vast resources of Warner Brothers and MGM behind them, but Gilbert Roland somehow managed the same effect on the tiny budgets of a studio renowned in those days as Hollywood’s dumping ground. And somehow he keeps one watching these tawdry films long after their promise has waned.

CROSSPLOT. United Artists, 1969. Roger Moore, Martha Heyer, Claudia Lange, Alexis Kanner, Francis Matthews, Bernard Lee. Screenplay by Leigh Vance, with additional dialogue by John Kruse. Director: Alvin Rakoff.

   This swiftly paced thriller made between Roger Moore’s stints as the Saint and James Bond is an entertaining exercise in minor Hitchcock with good overall performances and a complex and twisty plot.

   Moore is Gary Fenn, a playboy advertising executive in swinging sixties London who finds himself up to his neck in intrigue a la John Buchan when the bad guys have the bright idea to use him to find Marla Kugash (Claudie Lange), a Hungarian model who has overheard an assassination plot at the hands of her aunt, television producer Jo Grinling (Martha Hyer), and assassin Ruddock (Francis Matthews — television’s Paul Temple and a Hammer film regular).

   Written by Saint script regulars Leigh Vance and John Kruse (who even wrote some of the non-Charteris Saint novels), and directed by Saint regular Alvin Rakoff, with much of the production crew from the Saint series (which had just wrapped up), this mostly looks like a made-for-television movie with a bit of nudity thrown in, but isn’t bad for that.

   The comedy is light, the suspense mild but effective, and there is at least one well done chase (despite some bad back projection) with Moore in a vintage car being pursued across the British countryside by a low flying helicopter.

   Despite the made for television look of the film, it has some effective moments when it almost rises above its television roots, and a likable and attractive cast hold it together.

   Moore was a natural at this sort of thing, though having just played Simon Templar and soon to do The Persuaders and then James Bond, it’s a bit hard to imagine that he’s any real danger from this lot of conspirators.

   Lange proves an attractive and offbeat heroine, and has a nice tasteful nude scene. Hyer is largely wasted in what is little more than the guest villain in a Man From U.N.C.L.E. episode, but Bernard Lee, M in the James Bond films, has a nice villainous turn to class the proceedings up.

   Complete with corny, but catchy, theme song, and psychedelic title credits, this is light entertaining fare you will likely feel more affection for than it actually deserves thanks to an attractive cast and low ambitions.

   It does exactly what it sets out to do without embarrassing itself, its cast, or the viewers’ intelligence, which is higher praise than many a more ambitious thriller. It’s a lightweight romantic comedy thriller, and that’s all it had any ambition to be. You can’t complain too loudly when a film succeeds at exactly what it intended to be, and nothing more.

THE UNHOLY WIFE. RKO Radio Pictures, 1957. Diana Dors, Rod Steiger, Tom Tryon, Beulah Bondi, Marie Windsor, Arthur Franz, Joe De Santis. Screenplay: Jonathan Latimer, based on William Durkee’s play “The Prowlers,” telecast on the CBS series Climax! on 05 January 1956. Director: John Farrow.

   It’s something of a muddled mess overall, but there is still a lot to like in this end-of-the-era film noir, and noir or not, it needed to be filmed in color, else Diana Dors’ beautifully coiffed mane of brilliant platinum blonde hair would have been as cruelly wasted as a crime against nature itself.

   It begins, however, with Dors’ character, Phyllis Hochen, telling the story in what appears to be a dingy room of some type, possibly (and more than likely) a prison cell. Without makeup and with her hair perhaps her natural brown, it gives her a chance to display her acting ability, rather than her other more spectacular attributes. She is barely more than pretty in these scenes, but there’s an honesty about her that one does not notice when she’s playing bombshell, a role which in 1957 she was much well known for, by far.

   Accompanied by Gwen (Marie Windsor) as a barroom pickup artist, as she tells her story, Phyllis parlayed a small shot into picking up a husband, Paul Hochen (Rod Steiger), a very rich winegrower in northern California. This in spite of the fact that she has a young son and a husband lost in the war. Make that a double: she also warns him that she’s no good.

   A warning he ought to have taken. Bored with life in an isolated mansion, it is not long before Phyllis has found a lover, a rodeo cowboy played by the ultra-handsome Tom Tryon. And it is not long after that that Phyllis shoots a prowler by “accident.” The only problem is, the dead man is not her husband, but her husband’s best friend.

   Thinking quickly on her feet, the blonde mane not concealing an empty brain, she convinces her husband to —, then she twists her story around in court so that —, and Paul’s ailing mother overhears —, and then, and then, and then the end.

   Can you fill in the blanks? You’re going to have to, because I’m not telling. It’s believable enough, but it would be even more so if the characters weren’t quite so shallow – no, it’s not that they’re shallow. It’s more that we never get to know enough about them, only hints here and there. Some blatant, some hidden. The story shows us their actions. Their motivations are up for grabs.

   Some reviewers have taken what I took to be a straightforward story and twisted it up and down and inside out and coming up with another story altogether. I won’t tell you anything about that one, either. You’re better off making your own conclusions.

   Or in other words, other commentators have been all over the place with this one, including Rod Steiger’s performance, understated in a way that’s not easy to put into words and yet totally dynamic — but as long as you’re asking me, I liked it just fine.

   I do wish that Marie Windsor had had a longer part, though. Five minutes with Miss Windsor on the screen is not nearly enough.

CARTER BROWN – The Invisible Flamini. Signet T4854; paperback original; 1st printing, December 1971. Cover art by Robert McGinnis.

   If you’re in Hollywood, and you’re in trouble, Rick Holman is the man to see. In his day he’s hushed up more secrets of important people in the movie business than people like Louella Parsons, in her day, could ever ever have imagined. And I’m sure that Louella knew more than she ever told.

   Holman’s general investigative philosophy put into practice is one of laissez-faire. Even he admits it. By doing nothing he accomplishes more than half a dozen Lew Archers busily tearing up and down the California freeways.

   And the women he meets! Male fantasies come to life, every one of them. Carter Brown is not a writer for anyone with an ounce of appreciation for the feminist movement. He creates a male chauvinistic dream world with a consummate perfection unmatched outside the pages of Penthouse and Playboy.

   And, oh, yes. this one’s about a kidnapped Italian movie queen. If indeed it matters.

[UPDATE] 11-18-10. I suppose that if it does matter, and you’ll being asking for your money back if I don’t tell you more about the plot, I suppose I could read it again. I’d have to, since what you see above is all I remember. But I think it’s all you need to know. Previously assigned letter grade: C.

FATHER & SON. ITV1 (UK), June 7 through 10, July 2010. Dougray Scott, Sophie Okonedo, Ian Hart, Stephen Rea, Reece Noi, Wunmi Mosaku, Simon Delaney. Written by Frank Deasy. Director: Brian Kirk. (Previously shown on RTÉ (Ireland), 29 June through 20 July 2009.)

   This was another of those stories spread over successive evenings that seem to be the vogue over here nowadays. This was in four parts — Monday to Thursday, one hour each, less adverts.

   Set in Manchester, a city that has acquired a small reputation for gang violence, this concerns Michael Connor, a former criminal who has retired to a new life (and a new wife) after the murder of his first wife. He returns to Manchester when his estranged teenage son — who lives with his mother’s sister, a policewoman — is arrested and accused of shooting another teenager in a gang related killing.

   The story involves several strands with a prisoner and former colleague of the father keeping an eye on the son while attempting his own escape, and the involvement, possibly criminal, of the police both in Manchester and in Ireland.

   There are some discrepancies and anomalies — would a fifteen year old, accused but not convicted of a shooting, be placed in a cell with a hardened adult criminal, and would a Manchester criminal, now living in Ireland, have an accent that ranges over most of the British Isles? — but the story twisted and turned and managed to hold my attention throughout

KJELL ERIKSSON – The Cruel Stars of the Night. St. Martin’s Press, hardcover, May 2007; trade paperback, April 2008. Translated from the Swedish by Ebba Segerberg.

   Inspector Ann Lindell and her team at the Violent Crimes Division of the Uppsala Police struggle through much of this novel in an attempt to make sense of the murders of several elderly men, looking for connections that would link the murders in some rational fashion.

   In an initially apparently unrelated event, an elderly professor, the father of spinster Laura Hindersen, disappears. “He was a pain,” is the comment offered by a former colleague, and that rather general lack of interest and the absence of clues lead the investigator, Detective Sergeant Asa Lantz-Andersson, to conclude that she will have to wait for some unforeseen event that will resolve the stalled case.

   The novel is, for much of its length, a meticulously plotted procedural. In the final pages, it’s the characters and not the plot that dictate the genre-bending conclusion, undoubtedly less reassuring than the conventional wrap-up but intellectually more challenging and disturbing.

   And it’s that aspect of Eriksson’s artfulness that interests me and makes me eager to return to his work.

The Ann Lindell series —

    1. The Princess of Burundi (2006)

    2. The Cruel Stars of the Night (2007)
    3. The Demon from Dakar (2008)

MARK SADLER – Circle of Fire. Random House, 1973. Berkley, paperback, 1989.

   Mark Sadler is a pseudonym of the prolific Dennis Lynds, who also writes as Michael Colllins (about Dan Fortune) , William Arden, and John Crowe. As Sadler he writes about private eye Paul Shaw. Circle of Fire is the fourth in the series, a complex book that is readable without being outstanding.

   Paul Shaw is called in to investigate when Dick Delaney, his California partner, is shot and seriously wounded while working on a case. Local politician Russell Dobson was blown up in a car with Lilian Marsak, whom he apparently had just picked up.

   Shaw must determine whether the killer had a personal or political motive for getting Dobson out of the way, and eventually must decide if he was the intended victim after all.

   What did Delaney find out that got him shot? The book is very complicated and somewhat confusing, and Shaw is a little slow in recognizing one of the major possibilities in the case. It’s competent enough, I guess, but it has all been done before, and better (including the author’s own Dan Fortune series).

   One switch: for once the out-of-town investigator is not continually hassled by the local police.

The Paul Shaw series —

    The Falling Man. Random House, 1970.
    Here to Die. Random House, 1971.
    Mirror Image. Random House, 1972.

    Circle of Fire. Random House, 1973.
    Touch of Death. Raven House, 1981.

    Deadly Innocents. Walker, 1986.