AFTERLIFT: Chapter One “There Are Rules.” ComiXology (an Amazon company), October 2019. Writer: Chip Zdarsky. Artist: Jason Loo. Colorist: Paris Alleyne. Available only on Kindle.

   A young Chinese-American girl named Janice Chen makes her living driving for Cabit, whenever she’s not driving for Lyft or Drivepal. Her parents, especially her mother, do not approve, but she has a technique that often works when a fare starts to get a little too friendly. She stops the car, says it looks like construction up ahead, asks to check on the passenger’s iPhone, clicks on five stars, and drops him off.

   Street smart, that she is, but her very next passenger is one she has no way of being prepared for. It’s a man who is escorting a young girl, but not just any young girl. She is dead, and commandeering Janice’s car, the man is taking her to her afterlife.

   This is but the first of a five-issue limited series, and it ends with a horde of demons chasing the car. Where the story goes from here, I have no idea, but the setup is certainly a doozy.

   The art is terrific, maybe even better than the story I’ve read so far, bright and extremely colorful. On the other hand, I can’t believe that this is the future of comic books. On my Kindle the lettering in the word balloons is so small that I have to keep zooming in and out, first to read the dialogue, and out again to see the larger picture.

   Then again, I am Old — I have been reading comic books for almost 75 years — and I need cataract surgery. Printing comics has to be expensive, and maybe eliminating a printed version will catch on. With this particular comic, I am impressed with the final product, the way it looks, if not how it feels, but… Perhaps your guess is better than mine.

ANTHONY BOURDAIN – Bone in the Throat. Villard, hardcover, 1995. Bloomsbury, paperback, 2000.

   Bourdain is Chef at one of Manhattan’s “hotter-than-hot” new dining spots, and this is his first novel. I sort of expeted another cozy food book and almost skipped it. Turned out it wasn’t, though.

   Tommy Pagano isn’t one of the Boys, but he’s related to them. He’s sous chef at a restaurant in Little Italy controlled by his uncle Solly the Wig, who definitely is one of the Boys. Not one of the big boys, and not too highly thought of, but one of them. The Feds are after Solly and his boss, Charley Wagons, and they’re watching and turning everybody in sight.

   The owner of he restaurant is wearing a wire and trying to keep everybody happy. Tommy gets dragged into the mess when he’s made an unwilling witness to some bad business by his uncle, and his dreams of becoming a big-time chef give way to nightmares about being a small-time con. Or maybe even a no-time-left corpse.

   This was not a cozy, or even a “humorous” look at mob life. It’s got sort of a wry tone and a couple of the characters were a little exaggerated, but it would take a pretty odd sense of humor to call it funny.

   The cooking background is interesting and not overdone, and Tommy Pagano is both a realistic and likable character. I don’t know anything about the Mafia, but these hoods seemed pretty genuine. Bourdain tells a good story with crisp dialog and well-drawn, if mostly sleazy characters, and I liked this.

  JAMES REASONER “War Games.” Novelette. Markham #5. First published in Mike Shayne Mystery Magazine, April 1982. Kindle reprint, 2013.

   The lead story in the same issue of Mike Shayne Mystery Magazine was a Mike Shayne novelette by Brett Halliday entitled “Deadly Queen,” which is of note especially because it just so happens that was ghostwritten by the same James Reasoner who wrote “War Games.” Between the two stories almost half of the magazine was work by James, one of a very few authors producing the same wordage today of the most prolific pulp writers of the 1920s and 30s. Over a million words a year? That’s a lot of typing!

   “War Games” the last of five stories he wrote about a PI by the name of Markham (not related to the TV detective of the same name). In it he’s called in by the head of a military academy for teenaged boys to find out who left him a threatening note in his desk in his office.

   There are a number of suspects. Colonel Rutledge is the sort of hard-nosed former military officer who runs a tight ship, to say the least. The most obvious suspects are a couple of boys, one of whom he expelled, the other a boy from own he is friends with, and an English instructor who was dressed down publicly for using the book Catch 22 in class.

   The colonel does not mention his granddaughter, who lives on the grounds, but Markham quickly adds her to his own list, as not surprisingly, she is, shall we say, the rebellious type. The story proceeds from here, and it’s a good one.

   The story is too short to learn much about Markham as a person, except that he’s the kind of person who, when he accepts a job, makes sure he finishes it. I was reminded more of Philip Marlowe than I was Sam Spade, say, if you’d like a couple of other PI’s to to compare him to. Even so, more than Marlowe, Markham is a guy I’d like to sit down and have a beer someday, if ever I could.

   And this is the kind of story that makes you wish there were more than just the five. The good news is that three of them are already available as Kindle ebooks, as indicated by a (*) below. What I’d really like to see, though, is a print collection of all five. Back issues of Mike Shayne magazines have become awfully hard to find in the wild, and that issue of Skullduggery? Impossible.

       The Markham series —

All the Way Home. Mike Shayne Mystery Magazine, April 1979
Death and the Dancing Shadows. Mike Shayne Mystery Magazine March 1980 (*)

The Man in the Moon. Mike Shayne Mystery Magazine, April 1980 (*)
The Double Edge. Skullduggery, Summer 1981
War Games. Mike Shayne Mystery Magazine, April 1982 (*)

K. K. BECK – Young Mrs. Cavendish and the Kaiser’s Men. Walker, hardcover, 1987. Ivy, paperback reprint, April 1989.

   The year is 1916, and the US is not yet in World War I. What the Germans hope to do is make sure we don’t, and somehow a lonely spot in the Arizona desert is an important part of their plans. And, although they don’t know it, so is Maude Teasdale Cavendish.

   She’s 29, divorced, and an ambitious society reporter for the San Francisco Globe. What she uncovers begins a rousing Rover Boys type adventure, with the addition of two spunky, forward-looking heroines [the other being young debutante Louise Arbour, a whiz at driving her very own motor car, and who kidnappers mistake Mrs. Cavendish for, early on in the story], back when most women still had “delicate constitutions.”

UPDATE:   I only vaguely remember this one, but my review of it makes it sound as though I’d enjoy reading it again. I do remember thinking I’d like to read another of Mrs. Cavendish’s adventures, but alas, it didn’t happen.

JAMAICA INN. Mayflower Pictures, UK, 1939. Paramount, US, 1939. Charles Laughton (also co-prodcuer), Leslie Banks, Maureen O’Hara, Robert Newton, Marie Ney, Horace Hodge. Based on the novel by Daphne du Maurier. Director: Alfred Hitchcock.

   I recently had the chance to watch the 75th Anniversary 4K restoration of Alfred Hitchcock’s Jamaica Inn on the Cohen Media Channel. And you know what? I thoroughly enjoyed it. It’s a lovingly crafted, atmospheric thriller that moves along at a steady clip, immerses you in a cinematic landscape of danger, and propels you into a seedy, sweaty, windswept world filled with thieves and cutthroats.

   Adapted to the big screen from Daphne du Maurier’s eponymous 1936 novel, Jamaica Inn hinges on Charles Laughton’s lead performance as Sir Humphrey Pengallan, a dissolute local official who moonlights as the ringleader of a group of marauders.

   Upon his orders, innkeeper Joss Merlyn (Leslie Banks) and his gang of lowlifes deliberately wreck ships off the Cornish coast, then looting the goods aboard and murdering any survivors. It’s apparently a lucrative operation for Pengallan, a bloviating drunkard who has built quite a life for himself in the far southwestern corner of England.

   All that changes when Joss’s niece, Mary Yellen (Maureen O’Hara in her first major screen role), shows up at the Jamaica Inn. She has come from Ireland and has no place to stay apart from with her aunt. It doesn’t take long for the seemingly innocent Mary to realize that something sinister is afoot.

   After accidentally witnessing Joss and his men’s attempt to hang Jem Trehearne (Robert Newton) for betraying their gang, she becomes caught up in a whirlwind of deceit and mortal danger. By her side is Treherane, who turns out to be something more than a mere criminal.

   What makes Jamaica Inn so enjoyable to watch is not merely the exceptional performances from the cast – notably Laughton’s scenery chewing villainy – but also the ways in which Hitchcock utilizes the still nascent medium of film to portray a tense, claustrophobic atmosphere. Throughout the movie, one gets the sense of how entrapped all of the characters – heroes and villains – alike feel.

   The heroes know that danger is all around them. The criminals know they know they can only outrun the law for so long. Much as in in Notorious (1946), which I reviewed here, Hitchcock places great emphasis on how various objects – a rope designed for hanging, a knife uses to set someone free from captivity, a musket, a lantern – are integral to the plot.

   It is my understanding – and correct me that I am wrong – that Hitchcock himself later on did not think highly of his film and that the critics at the time were not especially keen on it. But no matter. It remains an elegantly crafted film, subdued in tone, without a lot of fanfare. Kudos to the Cohen Film Collection for restoring this classic. I plan to rewatch it again sometime in the years ahead.

H. BEDFORD-JONES “The Case of the Kidnaped (sic) Duchess.” Novelette. John Solomon. First published in Argosy, 05 January 1935.

   That’s the voice of John Solomon, ship’s chandler, mysterious millionaire, operator of one of the best private espionage operations in the World, the short, stout (think Edmund Gwenn as Santa but minus the beard) Cockney adventurer who first appeared under the by-line Allan Hawkwood, but who, by 1935, was appearing under Bedford-Jones’ own name and commanding the cover of Argosy with the little Cockney’s adventurers.

   This one is a mystery novelette that begins in foggy London where engineer Carson, an American, and one of a long line of engineers, grocers, doctors, and the like to act as assistant to Solomon’s myriad schemes in all ports of call, has received an urgent message to join him before they sail that night for Europe to assist the Duchess o’ Furstein.

   If this sounds all very Holmesian, keep in mind Bedford-Jones also wrote a Holmes pastiche so successfully it passed for a lost Conan Doyle story among some scholars.

   But our guide here is Solomon, not Holmes, though he is just as high-handed, clever, and dangerous to know as the Baker Street sleuth, if less cerebral and more given to flashing guns.

   Carson has hardly arrived at the tobacconists where he’s been summoned when Solomon rushes by, drops a wallet, which he commands Carson to hide, and seconds later is in the hands of a constable accused of picking the pocket of a ’toff, soon to have Carson “up to his neck in emeralds, Sicilian palaces…” as the wallet belongs to Sir Basil Lohancs, who has already kidnapped the duchess, and is delivering her to London on his yacht that werry, I mean very, evening.

   Baghdad on the Thames was never more so. Heady stuff in the pulp era.

   The Duchess has been using her wealth, estates, and is threatening to use her fabulous emeralds, to continue social work in Palermo. Lohanc’s can’t have that. The result as Solomon says is that the Duchess is in “a werry bad fix, as the old gent said when ’e buried ’is third wife.” Lohanc is a bad one “Money, brains and nor scruples whatever, sir. What ’e goes after ’e gets, that’s ’is boast,”and later, “Murder don’t mean nothing to ’im.”

   Scotland Yard and the French police have been fooled, and now the Duchess’s only hope is Solomon and Carson, boarding a yacht full of kidnappers and potential murderers to make a rescue on the fog bound docks with the information her loyal Sicilian maid died getting to them. Without getting all Sax Rohmer on us, Bedford-Jones evokes Limehouse and its environs and a sense of romance built out of the reality and not vague menace and shadows. His Limehouse is that of Thomas Burke and Arthur Morrison.

   Solomon gives Carson an automatic and instructions to get on the yacht while it works its way up the Thames to London, an impossible job. “There ain’t nothing impossible, sir, if so be you ’as a ’ead,” Solomon advises and he proves right, Carson getting on board and making contact with the Countess. Now what ever happens depends on Solomon and his plans, and as always Solomon’s plans are played close to the vest, Carson is captured and drugged by Lohanc and Dr. Vecchhi the murderous doctor in his pay.

   Meanwhile the usual close calls, disasters, and last minute rescues follow until the last possible moment when Solomon plays his last card, the love of a Sicilian whose wife died to protect her mistress.

   If it strikes you that with a little bit of tweaking here and there, this might well be the outline for a thriller by John Buchan, or later Victor Canning, you aren’t far off.

   It’s no great mystery, but as action adventure goes, it’s splendidly told, replete with villains who deserve their just rewards, noble heroes and heroines, and always, the presence of John Solomon, one of the great captains of pulp fiction, part adventurer, part avenger, and always righter of wrongs, cherry cheeked and wispy haired man about adventure. There is nothing quite like him or his kin in most modern fiction today.

   For anyone interested you can download or read this at Internet Archive under their Pulp Collection. The issue also includes a dog story by Albert Peyson Terhune and serial chapters by F. Van Wyck Mason, Theodore Roscoe, and Fred MacIsaac, a pretty good issue.

THE PROTECTORS. “2,000 Ft to Die.” Incorporated Television Company (ITC), UK. 29 September 1972 (Episode 1, Season 1). 30min. Robert Vaughn (Harry Rule), Nyree Dawn Porter (Contessa Caroline di Contini), Tony Anholt (Paul Buchet). Guest Cast: Harvey Hall. Co-prodcuers: Gerry Anderson & Reg Hill. Screenplay: Terence Feeley. Director: John Hough .

   The Protectors were a somewhat informal group of European jet set private eyes who often got together to solve cases too tough to handle on their own, each having their individual specialties. They were Harry Rule (London), Contessa Caroline di Contini (Italy), and Paul Buchet (Paris).

    The year 1972 was rather late in the history of television for action adventure shows such as this one to have only 30 minutes of running time. The first episode, “2,000 Ft to Die,” would maybe make sense if it were twice the length, but it didn’t, and it doesn’t.

   It has something to do with a scientist who is the last of five working on a project to create srtifical gold who is still alive, and he calls in The Protectors for help. It doesn’t stop him from doing a stunt for some moviemakers consisting of jumping out of an airplane with a supposedly faulty parachute. Whoever it is who wants him dead makes sure that it really is faulty.

   You can’t make a coherent TV show consisting only of good-looking people, glamorous party scenes, and colorful camera shots and lots of action. That’s all I saw in this one, I’m sorry to say. The show did last for 52 episodes running over two season, so maybe I’m wrong. I don’t think it caught on in this country.

From Wikipedia:

   Marion Gibbons (née Chesney; 10 June 1936 -30 December 2019) was a Scottish writer of romance and mystery novels since 1979. She wrote numerous successful historical romance novels under a form of her maiden name, Marion Chesney, including the Travelling Matchmaker and Daughters of Mannerling series.

   Using the pseudonym M. C. Beaton, she also wrote many popular mystery novels, most notably the Agatha Raisin and Hamish Macbeth mystery series. Both of these book series have been adapted for TV. She also wrote romance novels under the pseudonyms Ann Fairfax, Jennie Tremaine, Helen Crampton, Charlotte Ward, and Sarah Chester.

   In addition to the books below (courtesy of the Fantastic Fiction website), many of her romance novels may have considerable mystery content:

       The Hamish Macbeth Mysteries —

1. Death of a Gossip (1985)

2. Death of a Cad (1987)
3. Death of an Outsider (1988)
4. Death of a Perfect Wife (1989)
5. Death of a Hussy (1990)
6. Death of a Snob (1991)
7. Death of a Prankster (1992)
8. Death of a Glutton (1993)
aka Death of a Greedy Woman
9. Death of a Travelling Man (1993)

10. Death of a Charming Man (1994)
11. Death of a Nag (1995)
12. Death of a Macho Man (1995)
13. Death of a Dentist (1997)
14. Death of a Scriptwriter (1998)
15. Death of an Addict (1999)
15.5. A Highland Christmas (1999)
16. Death of a Dustman (2001)
17. Death of a Celebrity (2001)
18. Death of a Village (2001)
19. Death of a Poison Pen (2004)

20. Death of a Bore (2005)
21. Death of a Dreamer (2006)
22. Death of a Maid (2007)
23. Death of a Gentle Lady (2008)
24. Death of a Witch (2009)
25. Death of a Valentine (2009)
26. Death of a Chimney Sweep (2011)
aka Death of a Sweep
27. Death of a Kingfisher (2012)
28. Death of Yesterday (2013)
29. Death of a Policeman (2012)
30. Death of a Liar (2015)
30.5. Knock, Knock, You’re Dead! (2016)
31. Death of a Nurse (2016)
32. Death of a Ghost (2017)
33. Death of an Honest Man (2018)
34. Death of a Love (2020)

       The Agatha Raisin Mysteries —

1. The Quiche of Death (1992)

2. The Vicious Vet (1993)
3. The Potted Gardener (1994)
4. The Walkers of Dembley (1995)
5. The Murderous Marriage (1996)
6. The Terrible Tourist (1997)
7. The Wellspring of Death (1998)
8. The Wizard of Evesham (1999)
9. The Witch of Wyckhadden (1999)
10. The Fairies of Fryfam (2000)
11. The Love from Hell (2001)

12. The Day the Floods Came (2001)
13. The Case of the Curious Curate (2001)
14. The Haunted House (2003)
15. The Deadly Dance (2004)
16. The Perfect Paragon (2005)
17. Love, Lies and Liquor (2006)
18. Kissing Christmas Goodbye (2007)
19. Agatha Raisin and a Spoonful of Poison (2006)
20. There Goes The Bride (2009)
21. Busy Body (2010)

22. As the Pig Turns (2011)
23. Hiss and Hers (2012)
24. Something Borrowed, Someone Dead (2013)
25. The Blood of an Englishman (2014)
26. Dishing the Dirt (2015)
27. Pushing up Daisies (2016)
28. The Witches’ Tree (2017)
29. The Dead Ringer (2018)
30. Beating About the Bush (2019)
31. Hot to Trot (2020)

   Novellas —

Agatha Raisin and the Christmas Crumble (2012)
Hell’s Bells (2013)
Agatha’s First Case (2015)

       The Edwardian Murder Mysteries —

1. Snobbery with Violence (2003)

2. Hasty Death (2004)
3. Sick of Shadows (2005)
4. Our Lady of Pain (2006

GERRY BOYLE – Port City Crossfire. Brandon Blake #3. ePublishing Works, paperback, August 2019. Setting: Portland Maine.

First Sentence: Mid-September, not quite fall but the Maine summer slipping away.

   It’s every policeman’s nightmare. Officer Brandon Blake becomes involved in a foot chase with a suspect known as Thrasher who is wearing a Go-Pro camera and holding a gun. Blake is forced to shoot, but he forgot to turn on his camera and the suspect’s Go-Pro memory stick is gone. Thatch’s wealthy parents and his girlfriend Amanda are out for Blake’s job and his freedom. But being suspended doesn’t stop Brandon from following his instincts as he finds the high-school diary of Danni Moulton which leads him into danger from her boyfriend Clutch.

   This is a first chapter that really works. You meet the principal characters, learn a bit about their life, and, true to the life of a cop, go from low intensity to very high intensity in the blink of an eye realizing just how a bad situation can happen and the reaction afterward. Boyle makes it real and painful.

   One quickly becomes aware of why Boyle’s writing is so good. It’s refreshing to have a police officer who isn’t hardened and cynical, who feels the impact of their action, who doesn’t shrug and walk away but has a very human reaction including self-doubt. And the victim’s parents: Boyle knows how to depict raw emotion.

   Brandon does get himself into situations. An excellent description of him is given–“I know your type, my friend. Once you get on to something, you don’t let go. You ride it into the ground even if you do down with it.”

   All of Boyle’s characters are effective. Kat, Brandon’s partner is a good, strong character and an excellent balance to Brandon as she sees through him and doesn’t pull any punches. His personal partner, Mia, is someone one may particularly come to like. And then there’s Matthew Estusa, the classic gotcha’-style reporter who’ll do whatever it takes for a story is certainly someone who is recognizable.

   Twists and threads: the plot twists are very well done and effective; sometimes shocking. “Friggin’ A, Blake, … Is there anything you don’t wind up in the middle of?” The number of threads counts up to where one finds oneself thinking ‘here is another thread to pull.’

   As the threads begin to weave together, the danger and suspense increase. The plot did seem over-complicated, a twist that was a bit too convenient and a move that, especially for a cop, crept into the realm of being a bit TSTL (too stupid to live). However, those were small things and were easily forgiven in light of there being a great climax and an excellent line toward the end.

   Although the book is listed as A Brandon Black Mystery, Book 1, that’s not strictly accurate as this is the third book in the series following Port City Shakedown and Port City Black and White, both published by Down East Books. It’s worth going back to the beginning.

   Port City Crossfire is a well-done police procedural. It has a tone different from others one might read, and a protagonist who is both complex and compelling. Boyle walks more on the noir side of the street, but in a very restrained way. There is something rather addictive about his writing.

Rating: Good Plus.

       The Brandon Blake series —

Port City Shakedown (2009)
Port City Black and White (2011)
Port City Crossfire (2019)
Port City Rat Trap (2020)

J. LANE LINKLATER “Mystery of the Mexicali Murders.” PI Alan Rake. First published in 10-Story Detective, January 1941. Reprinted in The Noir Mystery Megapack (Wildside Press, Kindle edition, 2016).

   Although the author of several hundred stories for the pulp fiction magazines, J. Lane Linklater, the pen name of Alexander William Watkins (1892-1971), certainly qualifies as an unknown author today.

   He did write seven hardcover mystery novels, all with a private eye character named Silas Booth. I’ve always meant to read one, but for some fault of my own, I never have.

   One series he wrote for Detective Fiction Weekly had lawyer Hugo Oakes as the leading character, and Monte Herridge wrote about him earlier on this blog here.

   He had few other recurring characters in the stories he wrote for the pulp magazines, but as far as I know, “Mystery of the Mexicali Murders” is the only appearance of private eye Alan Drake, a fellow who reminds me a bit about a fellow who Dashiell Hammett often wrote about.

   Here is the first paragraph of the story:

   This is, of course, Alan Rake. He is here in the area along the border between California and Mexico after receiving an urgent telegram from the head of a big fruit shipping outfit, but when the man is shot dead in front of him when he first meets him, he decides to stay on the case and see if there’s some way he can still get paid the $5000 that was promised him.

   The case is a complicated one, with lots of suspects and a setting that is over 100 degrees during the day and not much better at night. One girl in particular, a young spitfire with flashing eyes named Edna, catches his attention.

   But more than the characters, and who it was who killed Warnbecker, takes second place to the setting, a cantaloupe-growing area that Linklater must have known well to describe it in as much depth as he does, including its vast underbelly of criminal activity. Rake mixes in well, seeing and observing, and quite remarkably, thinking too.

   Linklater was no Hammett — I should make that totally clear — but a better editor could have helped make the ending a lot tighter, and if so, this might be the small gem of a story that it almost is.