MICHAEL ROBOTHAM – Bleed for Me. Sphere, UK, hardcover, 2010. Mulholland Books, US, hc, February 2012.

Genre:   Unlicensed Investigator: Psychiatrist. Leading character:  Joe O’Laughlin (4th in series). Setting:   England.

First Sentence:   I should start by telling you my name, although it’s not really important.

    Psychiatrist Joe O’Laughlin is trying to deal with having Parkinson’s disease, being separated from his wife and only seeing his daughter part time. When his daughter’s best friend is accused of murdering her father, a former police detective, Joe can’t ignore his daughter’s plea to help.

    I’ll admit I’m always excited when a new Robotham book comes out and, once again, he delivers. From the very powerful and disturbing prologue to the nail-biting ending, I was completely absorbed.

    One thing I really appreciate is that, although this is the fourth book in the series, he doesn’t assume you’ve read any of the previous books. Without burdening the plot or slowing down the story, within a very short period the author does an excellent job of providing a comprehensive back story on the characters. You never feel as though you’ve missed something.

   The portrayal of a couple who are amicably yet needfully separated is effective without being maudlin. I don’t know how accurate the psychiatry aspects are; it does seem Joe is, at time, a bit too insightful for belief, but it works and provides some interesting observations.

    Having recently served on a criminal-case jury; albeit not a murder, I found his comments on juries fascinating as well as the demonstration that, with motivation, anyone can be pushed to violence.

    It’s the balance of introspection and suspense that brings me back to Robotham every time. The plot is complex, twisty and fast-paced. I liked that all the clues were there to identify the killer, yet I didn’t, and that justice prevailed.

    If you’ve not yet discovered him, Robotham is an author I definitely recommend trying.

Rating:   Good Plus.

       The Joseph O’Loughlin series —

1. The Suspect (2004)

2. Lost (2005) aka The Drowning Man (US)
3. Shatter (2008)
4. Bleed for Me (2010)

   Recently while discussing PulpFest 2011 I made the claim that Pulp Vault 14 was the best ever issue of a pulp fanzine. I was immediately questioned by a reader concerning this statement. First, what qualifies me to make such a claim? I’ve been collecting pulps since the 1950’s and I’ve read most of the pulp fanzines published along the way. (By the way, I’m not talking about the SF fanzines which is a different subject.)

   The first quality pulp fanzine that I read was Lynn Hickman’s Pulp Era in the late 1960’s and early 1970’s. During the same period I was reading Fred Cook’s Bronze Shadows which published Robert Jones survey of the weird menace pulps in several issues.

   I was so impressed by this long article that I literally nagged Bob Jones into writing the book, The Shudder Pulps, and we became good friends especially through our correspondence which lasted 20 years until Bob’s early death.

    Robert Weinberg published Pulp which I recall as lasting 6 issues.

   Then I became a subscriber to Xenophile which was an excellent ad zine full of for sale and want ads. The editor was Nils Hardin who also started publishing articles about the pulps. The magazine lasted over 40 issues in the 1970’s. Echoes lasted over 100 issues and was edited by Tom and Ginger Johnson.

   John Gunnison published The Pulp Collector and Doug Ellis started Pulp Vault. Another quality pulp fanzine was Purple Prose edited by Mike Chomko. At present we have Blood n Thunder, edited by Ed Hulse, another excellent magazine which has just reached the 30th issue.

   Other magazines were published but the above titles remain in my memory as the best. If I have left out your favorite pulp fanzine please let me know in the comments.

   All the above editors have one thing in common, they all were awarded the Lamont Award, or in Mike Chomko’s case, the Munsey Award. If we tried to pick the best single issue from all the above titles, we would find no consensus among all the issues.

   Until Pulp Vault 14, that is. Fifteen years ago when Doug Ellis published Pulp Vault 12/13, I began pestering him about the next issue. It had taken him three years to publish issue 12/13 and I was worried that issue 14 might also take three years.

   Each year at Pulpcon, I asked him the same question, “When will Pulp Vault 14 be published?” His response was always “Soon, Walker”. Well it took 15 years but the wait was worth it.

   What makes this issue the best ever? First of all it is larger than any single issue that I recall: 264 pages in the large 8 by 10 inch format. It has at least 10 major articles including an unpublished Virgil Finlay cover. Actually one article makes this issue a must buy: a 44 page piece by Mike Ashley titled, “Blue Book — The Slick in Pulp Clothing.” This magazine is one of the great pulp titles and lasted over 50 years, 1905-1956. (It was later revived by another publisher as a men’s adventure magazine, 1960-1975.) Mike Ashley covers the magazine’s history in five long chapters.

   This tremendous survey belongs right up there with the great pulp surveys, such as Ed Hulse’s two-part coverage of Popular Magazine and his slightly shorter two-part article on Short Stories. Both articles appear in Blood n Thunder as well as excellent issues devoted to Adventure and Dime Detective.

   Sam Moskowitz’s history of the Munsey publications is another fascinating survey but though it mainly covers All Story and Argosy, it really is about several magazines and not a survey of one title like Mike Ashley’s.

   I also don’t want to forget the extensive coverage of Western Story Magazine in Jon Tuska’s The Max Brand Companion and in Eggenhofer: The Pulp Years. Another great pulp magazine, Adventure, is covered in a long article by Richard Bleiler in The Adventure Index. Astounding also had a book covering its history.

   So Mike Ashley’s long piece on Blue Book belongs with the great pulp surveys. But that is just a part of Pulp Vault 14. We also have a long essay on Thrill Book by Will Murray; a discussion of the Clues Detective character Cyrus North (with a unpublished long novelet!); an article by Hugh Cave with a reprint of one of his very best long stories.

   And there’s more: an article on Singapore Sammy by Rick Lai; a memoir by Robert Barbour Johnson on the Weird Tales days; an article by J. Edward Leithead on writing for the pulps, especially the early western titles; Otto Binder on his trip to NYC and many photos of the NYC World SF Convention in 1939; artist and publisher Tom Roberts on painting Doc Savage; and David Saunders on his father Norman Saunders.

   That’s like ten major, long articles! And there is more such as Bob Weinberg on Strange Stories; Link Hullar on artist Frank Hamilton; and a long adventure novelette from Popular Magazine. So this is why I call Pulp Vault 14 the greatest single issue ever published of any pulp fanzine. Copies may be obtained from Black Dog Books or Amazon.com.

   On page 2 of the issue editor Doug Ellis says, “Walker, please don’t ask us about issue number 15!” Needless to say the first thing out of my mouth when I saw Doug at PulpFest in July 2011 was, “Hey Doug, when will the next issue of Pulp Vault be out?”

JUST OFF BROADWAY. 20th Century Fox, 1942. Lloyd Nolan, Marjorie Weaver, Phil Silvers, Janis Carter, Richard Derr. Screenplay by Arnaud d’Usseau, based on the character created by Brett Halliday and an idea by Jo Eisinger; photography by Lucien Andriot. Director: Herbert J. Leeds. Shown at Cinevent 40, Columbus OH, May 2008.

   This sixth, and penultimate Shayne film starring Nolan as the brash private eye, finds the series showing signs of running out of steam. Nolan is as engaging as ever, but the script, which has Shayne serving as a juror and attempting to prove that the wrong person is being tried while he’s sequestered with the jury, requires some stretch of the imagination to find credible.

   I will give the scriptwriter a point for originality (Shayne wraps up the case from the jury box with nary a peep from the judge or lawyers), but nothing for believability. Jim Goodrich, who watched this film with me, added that Phil Silvers, “as always,” brightens up the proceedings.

   Following the riches of the 1950s, the anthology series moved into its final period as a stimulating television form. The enormous mass of episodic series featuring regular characters placed the format of the anthology firmly on the back burner.

   Both Dow Hour of Great Mysteries (NBC, 1960) and Boris Karloff’s Thriller (NBC, 1960-62) were essentially, and quite effectively, horror-fantasy series, many with strong elements of mystery.

   Dow Hour used celebrated classics such as Mary Roberts Rinehart’s “The Bat”, John Willard’s “The Cat and the Canary” and Sheridan Le Fanu’s “The Inn of the Flying Dragon”.

   Half of the premier season of Thriller was composed of crime/suspense stories under producer Fletcher Markle, which included tales by Charlotte Armstrong, John D. MacDonald, Cornell Woolrich, Don Tracy and Fredric Brown. Discovering that horror-fantasy worked even better with viewers when they transmitted “The Purple Room” (1960), producers Maxwell Shane and William Frye took over from Markle and concentrated on the macabre. They unleashed scary treats such as Robert Bloch’s “The Cheaters” and “The Hungry Glass”, Robert E. Howard’s “Pigeons from Hell”, and Harold Lawlor’s “The Grim Reaper”. Much to the viewers’ delight.

   The opening season of Kraft Mystery Theatre (NBC, 1961-63; not to be confused with the 1958 series) was made up entirely of British cinema second features (B movies) and it was not until the second season (1962-1963) that the series proper began.

   The first two episodes of the latter (crime thrillers “In Close Pursuit” and “Death of a Dream”) were directed by Robert Altman. It wasn’t until I happened upon the Mike Doran/Steve exchange in Mystery*File (July 2009) that one episode that had previously puzzled me, called “Shadow of a Man” (1963) starring Broderick Crawford as insurance investigator Barton Keyes and his assistant Jack Kelly as Walter Neff (teleplay credited to Frank Fenton from a story by James Patrick with no mention of James M. Cain or Double Indemnity), was finally laid to rest. Thanks to their information, “Shadow of a Man” proved to be a pilot for a proposed Double Indemnity TV series.

   Something of an immediate sister show to the above, Kraft Suspense Theatre (NBC, 1963-65) boasted three interesting contributions: John D. MacDonald’s “The Deep End” (1964) and William P. McGivern’s “A Truce to Terror” (1964) and “Once Upon a Savage Night” (1964) [the latter published as Death on the Turnpike].

   Shamley Productions returned with The Alfred Hitchcock Hour (CBS, 1962-65), but now with its crisp little half-hour story format enlarged to an hour. Among the stretched-out storytelling could be found such gems as Woolrich’s “The Black Curtain” (1962), Richard Matheson’s “Ride the Nightmare” (1962), Henry Kane’s “An Out for Oscar” (1963), the latter with teleplay provided by David Goodis, the superbly spooky “Where the Woodbine Twineth” (1965), from a Davis Grubb story, and the genuinely unsettling “An Unlocked Window” (1965), from a story by Ethel Lina White.

   Although a mix of drama, comedy, musicals and would-be pilots, Bob Hope Presents The Chrysler Theatre (NBC, 1963-67) did present an altogether intriguing pilot, or rather a series of pilots, featuring Jack Kelly as private eye/secret agent Fredrick Piper. The first attempt was made with “White Snow, Red Ice” (1964), written by Richard Fielder. It was followed by “Double Jeopardy” (1965), co-starring Lauren Bacall, “One Embezzlement and Two Margaritas” (1966), written by Luther Davis, and, finally, “Time of Flight” (1966), written by Richard Matheson (here Kelly’s name changed to “Al Packer”).

   Oh, there was also “Guilty or Not Guilty” (1966), a legal drama pilot starring Robert Ryan and co-scripted by Evan Hunter & “Guthrie Lamb” (the latter name belonging to a private eye character created by Evan Hunter [writing as Hunt Collins] for Famous Detective Stories magazine in the early 1950s). Unfortunately, all of the above remained unsold.

   During the 1970s, between the TV pleasures of Harry O (ABC, 1974-76) and The Rockford Files (NBC, 1974-80), Joseph Wambaugh’s Police Story (NBC, 1973-78) was the only other series worth keeping an eye on (the author created the anthology for Columbia Pictures Television).

   Arguably, one of the finest genre anthologies to grace the small-screen, even though it was nearly 40 years ago, the earthy stories culled from LAPD interviews were developed into some remarkable episodes, among them “Requiem for an Informer”, where a careful rapport develops between a detective and his street-wise informer, “The Wyatt Earp Syndrome”, focusing on Harry Guardino’s obsessive officer, and the two-hour “Confessions of a Lady Cop”, with Karen Black as a vice detective on the edge of a nervous breakdown. The series Police Woman (NBC, 1974-78) evolved from “The Gamble” (1974) and Joe Forrester (NBC, 1975-76) from “The Return of Joe Forrester” (1975).

   Fallen Angels (Showtime, 1993; 1995) seemed to be created as something of a small-screen tribute to hard-boiled literature. The carefully constructed series unfolded its noir-ish stories at a leisurely pace, underlining a symbiotic relationship between actor and story.

   In this writer’s opinion, all episodes were nothing short of superb. Many remain etched firmly on the memory. For instance, Jonathan Craig’s “The Quiet Room”, in which two corrupt cops receive their just punishment, Jim Thompson’s “The Frightening Frammis”, celebrating flashbacks and femme fatales, and Chandler’s “Red Wind”, featuring an interminably morose Danny Glover as Marlowe.

   The above selected anthologies (including the earlier Part 5.0) had, admittedly, minimum influence on the TV Crime and Mystery genre in general, but their exposure of the work of important crime authors (the Chandlers, the Hammetts, the Christies) acknowledges the form as something of a television pinnacle.

   The sheer range and diversity of these one-off presentations during the latter half of the last century remain as something to marvel. Perhaps this overview may serve to mark its passing.

   The concluding Part of this history of genre anthologies will observe the UK television history.

Note:   The introduction to this series of columns by Tise Vahimagi on TV mysteries and crime shows may be found here, followed by:

Part 1: Basic Characteristics (A Swift Overview)
Part 2.0: Evolution of the TV Genre (UK)
Part 2.1: Evolution of the TV Genre (US)
Part 3.0: Cold War Adventurers (The First Spy Cycle)
Part 3.1: Adventurers (Sleuths Without Portfolio).
Part 4.0: Themes and Strands (1950s Police Dramas).
Part 4.1: Themes and Strands (Durbridge Cliffhangers)
Part 5.0: Theatre of Crime (US).

   Over the past 40 years I guess I’ve attended 40 pulp conventions and I’ve always traveled by car either alone or with another collector. This is the first year that five of us rented a van and it was quite an experience. Between the five collectors there must of been at least 200 years of collecting books, pulps, digests, and vintage paperbacks. Three of us even collect original pulp cover paintings, not to mention slicks and other old magazines such as literary magazines, men’s adventure magazines, etc.

   We kept each other amused by recalling strange book adventures and bizarre topics like The Craziest Pulp Collector I Have Known. Needless to say, some of the people in the van qualify for this title! I might as well mention the names of these demented souls who spend their lives dreaming of pulps and books. In addition to myself, the collectors cooped up in this van were Nick Certo, Steve Kennedy, Digges La Touche, and last and not least, Ed Hulse, who was our driver.

   Somehow, this overloaded van arrived safely a little over eight hours later. Even more surprising was the fact that we had not killed each other and were still on speaking terms. After checking into the Ramada Plaza, we all headed for the dealer’s room to set up our tables.

   It was the same large room as last year and held over 100 tables. Because the large unloading doors were open to the 95 degree heat, there appeared to be very little air conditioning in effect.

   We were not amused to find out at dinner that the restaurant was also very warm. Not only that but they were out of certain items on the menu, including hamburger at one meal. When I ordered beer, practically every brand I tried to get was not available. Frankly, the restaurant did not seem set up to handle a convention weekend.

   Next day when the dealer’s room opened officially, it was obvious that this was another rousing success due to the hard work of the PulpFest committee: Mike Chomko, Jack Cullers, Ed Hulse, and Barry Traylor. Jack Cullers also seemed to have an army of support from his family and friends.

   I really must say these people deserve the thanks of pulp collectors for putting on such an excellent show. The attendance was the highest yet of any Pulpcon or PulpFest, over 425 attendees, which is a nice 10% increase over last year’s figure.

   At my table, I sold far more than I thought I would, selling DVDs, cancelled checks from the files of Popular Publications and Munsey, and all 39 duplicate Manhunt’s.

   The biggest sale I noticed involved a 1929 Black Mask with white paper, in fine condition. The seller asked me what I thought it was worth and I said over $500, perhaps closer to a $1000. The first collector I told ran over and paid $900 for the issue. The unusual thing is that the reason the magazine sold was not because of the fine condition or because it was a 1929 Black Mask with a Hammett story. It sold because the collector was a rabid collector of Erle Stanley Gardner.

   Another big sale I witnessed was the Ace Double original cover painting for Mrs. Homicide by Norman Saunders. After much haggling, this went for over $8,000.

   Several pulp reprints made their debut including Ed Hulse’s new issue of Blood n Thunder; Savages by Gordon Young; and The Best of Blood n Thunder. I bought all three publications and Ed said he sold just about all the copies that he brought to the convention.

   Laurie Powers also had good sales on her new book, a collection of Paul Power’s stories, titled Riding the Pulp Trail. Tom Roberts of Black Dog Books also had several new books for sale, including Pulp Vault 14, the best single issue of a pulp fanzine ever published.

   Matt Moring of Altus Press has an ambitious reprint schedule, including collections of Fred Nebel’s Tough Dick Donahue, Kennedy and McBride, and Cardigan. These are major publications and well worth buying because the original Black Mask and Dime Detective pulps are so expensive.

   The 20th issue of The Pulpster also made its debut and looked like one of the best issues yet. The editor is Tony Davis and he included 10 articles, including an unpublished story by H. Russell Wakefield. There were articles on William Cox and H. Bedford Jones and Don Hutchison’s memories John Fleming Gould. He appeared at Pulpcon 19 in Wayne, NJ and I remember his visit vividly. I was high bidder on one of his sketches showing G-8’s Herr Doktor Krueger. John Locke is also present with an interesting piece on “Hunting Pulpsters In Graveyards”

   I heard later that John Locke and John Wooley visited the gravesite of D.L. Champion, who wrote such crazy series starring Inspector Allhoff for Dime Detective, and Rex Sackler for Black Mask. The grave is evidently near the convention hotel and I would have liked to visit it but then again I get very emotional about pulp writers and probably would have made a fool of myself, not to mention getting arrested for trying to sell the remains at PulpFest.

   One of the big surprises of the convention was the visit of former Pulpcon chairman and organizer, Rusty Hevelin. In the early years, Rusty single handedly kept Pulpcon going and deserves our thanks for his efforts, without which there might not be a convention all these years later.

   He received a round of applause as he entered the dealer’s room and because he is in his late 80’s, I figured he would just visit for a short time and then leave. However, he evidently enjoyed himself and stayed all three days. He even attended the evening programming with his friend, Gay Haldeman. Welcome back Rusty.

   Another collector I was glad to see, was Gordon Huber, the only person to actually attend every Pulpcon and Pulpfest since the first one in 1972. Unfortunately there were several collectors who could not attend this year, including such long time attendees as Al Tonik, Steve Lewis, and Dave Kurzman.

   The evening programming was some of the best I’ve ever seen. Some of the highlights were the three “Shadow” shorts from 1931-1932; the speech given by David Saunders on three pulp artists; the grandaughters of the pulps panel featuring Laurie Powers, Karen Cunningham, and Nicky Wheeler-Nicholson; Stephen Haffner’s talk on C. L. Moore; Garyn Roberts discussion of steampunk in the pulps and dime novels: and the panel on Walter Gibson and The Shadow.

   The auction was disappointing to me but I imagine some collectors found some good items. Tony Tollin won the Munsey Award for his extensive project which reprints the pulp novels featuring The Shadow and Doc Savage.

   The daytime programming consisted of readings and panels featuring contemporary authors discussing the new pulp fiction. The Pulpster also had an article about this recent movement and I have to admit I like the old pulp fiction from the original magazines. But evidently there are some fans of this new pulp fiction.

   Finally, I would like to thank the people responsible for stocking the Hospitality Room with beer, soda, and snacks. I also noticed a couple pizzas floating around and whoever ordered them let me have a piece. Each year, I notice Rusty Burke in the room and he is one of the collectors responsible for the beer and locking up the room. Thank you Rusty.

   I hope to see even more collectors in attendance next year because it is so important to support this convention.

   After all, book and pulp collectors are my favorite people…

PUSHING DAISIES. ABC-TV/Warner Brothers. October 3, 2007 through June 13, 2009. 22 episodes @60 minutes. Created and Showrunner : Bryan Fuller. Cast: Lee Pace (Ned), Anna Friel (Chuck), Chi McBride (Emerson Cod), Jim Dale (Narrator), Kristin Chenoweth (Olive Snook), Ellen Greene (Vivian), Swoosie Kurtz (Lily)

   One of the most redeeming qualities of television is no matter how mundane mainstream television gets, there are always the unusual and delightful series on the air we will remember forever. Sadly, most of these series last only long enough to find a small enthusiastic following.

   One such series was Pushing Daisies, a screwball comedy mystery fantasy featuring a pie maker who can raise the dead with a touch and uses that talent to help a PI solve murder mysteries.

   Ned’s secret magical finger was not without rules. The first touch woke the dead, but a second touch killed them forever. And if Ned did not touch them a second time within one minute the formerly dead would stay alive and someone near by would die.

   Enter cynical PI Emerson Cod, who saw a way to profit off Ned’s special talent. Ned would revive murder victims, ask them who killed them, solve the murder, and they would collect the reward. But it was never that easy and sixty seconds were never long enough. In the episode “Bitches,” the victim told them he was killed by his wife, but then they learned he had four wives.

   The mystery shared the story with the personal comedy drama of the strong well-developed characters, all with their own secrets and story lines. Because the series is told in fairy tale serial form, it is wise to watch the episodes in order.

   When Ned and Emerson decided to solve the murder of Ned’s childhood crush, Chuck, Ned decided to let her live at the cost of an evil funeral director’s life. Chuck and Ned fall in love but can never touch, the tragedy of two lovers who can never touch lightened by the funny ways Ned and Chuck find to express their love.

   Jim Dale’s narration and Jim Dooley’s music were perfect in setting the mood in this fantasy world of bright colors and odd locales. The camera with its angles and symmetrically frames shots also added to the series special look.

   Each story began with an absurd death such as an exploding scratch ‘n’ sniff book. After talking to the victim and getting little to go on, they would meet the suspects, find clues and twists until the killer was revealed. Meanwhile, a story arc featuring the relationships and secrets of the characters formed the subplot of each episode.

   Mystery fans found much to enjoy in the series, especially episodes such as “The Norwegians,” featuring the brilliant Norwegian forensic team and their crime solving bus, “Mother.”

   The oddness of characters, stories, look, sound, and fast paced lyrical dialog drew us happily into Pushing Daisies’ whimsical world of mystery, romance, and pie.

   The television series ended with closure for the characters, but there were still some loose ends involving Chuck and Ned’s fathers. After the series was canceled, Bryan Fuller promised Pushing Daisies would continue as a comic book much as Buffy the Vampire Slayer and others had.

   The comic book written by Bryan Fuller and drawn by Jonathan Wayshak continues in search of a publisher. In April 2011, Fuller posted at various websites the first two pages of the comic book. Here is a link to one site where you can read the two page sample of what is called “Season Three.”

   The complete TV series is available on DVD or for download. You can watch the first season of nine episodes for free here.

      

DAVID ALEXANDER – Hangman’s Dozen. Roy, hardcover, 1961.

    David Alexander is an underrated writer, in part at least because he had an idiosyncratic, sometimes self-consciously poetic and mannered style that some readers find offputting. But his work has undeniable power, and his novels featuring sporting newspaperman Bart Hardin are superior portraits of New York’s Broadway and Times Square in the 1950s. His plots, too, are unusual and compelling, as are his offbeat, colorful characters.

    Alexander was an even better short-story writer than novelist — certainly his prose was leaner and less eccentric in his short fiction — and the thirteen stories in Hangman’s Dozen are his best.

    “The Man Who Went to Taltavul’s” (which won a prize in one of Ellery Queen’s annual contests) and “Something in the Air” are excellent historical tales with startling twists at the end. “The Other Ones” is a chilling fantasy about some of the murderous inhabitants of hell. “Run from the Snakes” concerns a wet-brain, an alcoholic so far gone that he no longer even knows who he is.

    “Face of Evil” is a procedural about a cop named Romano, who appears in many of Alexander’s novels. “Love Will Find a Way” deals with three mountain climbers trapped by an avalanche and by their own passions in Switzerland, and the extraordinary crime perpetrated by two of them. The best of the hangman’s dozen is “Uncle Tom,” a devastating indictment of bigotry and racial injustice in the South — a story Alexander was unable to sell to any magazine in the Forties and Fifties.

    This is a heterogeneous collection, illustrating the range and depth of the author’s talent.

         ———
   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.

NOTE:   Coming soon to a blog near you (this one), reviews by Marcia Muller and Bill Pronzini of The Madhouse in Washington Square and Paint the Town Black, both also by David Alexander.

VICTORY. Paramount, 1940. Fredric March, Betty Field, Cedric Hardwicke, Jerome Cowan, Sig Ruman, Margaret Wycherly, Fritz Feld. Screenplay: John L. Balderston , based on the novel by Joseph Conrad. Director: John Cromwell.

   I’ve been trying to see Victory since I read about it in 1968. For some reason, however, Paramount retired the film and in the intervening umpty-ump years I’ve never once seen it listed on television or in a movie catalogue. All things come, however, to he who has Internet, and last month I finally found a copy—a bit soft, and bleached out in a couple spots, but watchable.

   Victory is probably Conrad’s most-filmed novel, starting with a silent in 1919, (lushly directed by Maurice Tourneur, but somewhat over-balanced by Lon Chaney Sr as knife-wielding Ricardo) and ending, for now, with a 1995 film starring Willem Dafoe, featuring Rufus Sewell as Ricardo and Sam Neill as plain Mr. Jones — as nasty a pair of heavies as you could want — plus Irene Jacob as a poignant heroine.

   The 1940 film was adapted by John L. Balderston, whose credits range from Bride of Frankenstein to Prisoner of Zenda, who brought to the project sense enough to leave Conrad’s novel mostly intact. Direction came from John Cromwell, never a cinematic pioneer, but always able to do a thing up nicely — check out movies like Algiers, Dead Reckoning and The Enchanted Cottage to see what I mean.

   Cromwell fills Victory with steamy jungles, sweltering hotels and blistering thunderstorms, but his main focus is on the actors, with Fredric March his usual fine self, and Betty Field a remarkably lovely heroine.

   Field never achieved stardom, but she had major roles in important-looking pictures like Of Mice and Men, The Great Gatsby and King’s Row, and did very well by them—pperhaps she was too good an actress to be a star, but she trouped on to the end, finally trading insults with Clint Eastwood in Coogan’s Bluff. (1968.)

   The acting triumph in Victory, though, goes to Sir Cedric Hardwicke and Jerome Cowan as plain Mr. Jones and Martin Ricardo; I honestly never knew these two could act like this. Hardwicke, usually the stuffy patriarch, plays Jones like a cross between Oscar Wilde and Lee Van Cleef, his every gesture languid and deadly, casually referring to past murder and dismissing it with a bored, “Ah well, it’s a long story. Another time perhaps.”

   Even more surprising is Jerome Cowan, normally a rather uninspiring player, who comes on unshaven and cat-like, sporting a fine cockney accent and darting about the scenery as he pursues Betty Field with stylish lust. Given a chance to stretch a bit, Cowan and Hardwicke indulge themselves wonderfully, and together they make this a film to treasure and watch again.

DEBORAH CROMBIE – A Share in Death. Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1993. Berkley, paperback, May 1994. Avon, pb, August 2003.

   A Share in Death is the first of what is now fourteen books in author Deborah Crombie’s Duncan Kincaid & Gemma James series, both of Scotland Yard. Kincaid is a rising star in the ranks and a Detective Superintendent at the time this one takes place. We do not see much of Gemma. She’s a Sergeant newly assigned to Kincaid, and (we are told) they work as quite a team together.

   But thanks to a cousin and his wife who couldn’t get away, Kincaid is off to Yorkshire at the beginning of the book, for a bit of pampering at a luxury timeshare he couldn’t begin to afford on his own, while Gemma is left to take care of loose ends back in London. And quite naturally murder soon occurs, then another, and Kincaid’s attempt at anonymity is foiled almost at once.

   While of course anyone from the outside might have been the killer, the odds are highly against it. This is the present version of one of those old isolated manor house mysteries of the 30s and 40s, where the killer is one of the suspects, but which one?

   The Texas-born Crombie’s forte is description, characterization and dialogue, three big pluses that not every detective story writers has a full supply of, and which has made her books quite popular, following as they do the lives of the two lead characters throughout the series, as well as the cases they work on together. (A Share in Death was nominated for the Agatha and Macavity awards for Best First Novel of 1993, and the fifth in the series, Dreaming of the Bones, was nominated for a Best Novel Edgar by the MWA for Best Novel in 1997.)

   I may not visit the right websites, however, as I haven’t read a lot about her, not as much as I think I should have, considering that she writes old-fashioned detective stories combined with the “cozy” aspects that present day fans seem to demand.

   Description, characterization and dialogue: all three present and accounted for. The plotting I had some problems with. Not major ones, but when a suspect and possible witness starts to tell the investigating officer something, and they’re interrupted before they can say their piece, don’t your armchair detecting organs make you sit up and take notice? Mine do, and they did.

   And it’s always a problem when the concluding chapter is the weakest of the book. The clues are all there – I checked to make sure – but it’s only under the barest of possibilities that Kincaid could have made the jump in logic that he did and come up with the identity of the killer, accurately, when he did. Maybe, I grant you, but only maybe.

   The next would-be victim’s behavior is even more inexplicable, especially after a previous attempt on his/her life. Hie off by yourself to an isolated spot in the local countryside? Not me, not if it were I, not one chance in a thousand, and that’s the understatement of the year.

   I tell you this not to dissuade you from reading the book, far from it. There is far too much good to it for that to be my intention. It does suggest that writing a puzzle to be solved in a mystery novel is much harder than anyone who has never tried it may think. For a first novel and these exceptions, A Share in Death is awfully good.

WILL COOK – Killer Behind a Badge. Avon T-867; paperback original, 1960. John Curley, large print hardcover, 1994.

   A western novel, and in only 128 pages, it packs a nifty punch. Will Cook, who also wrote as Wade Everett, James Keene, and Frank Peace, had the knack of summing up a person’s life history in just a few descriptive sentences.

   Take, for example, the first paragraph of the book:

   The power in town belongs to Jefford Lane. From page 7:

   The local law is in the hands of Manning Cordell. From page 8:

   I could go on, but these are three of the main characters, all important, if not essential, to the plot. Cordell is tough on lawbreakers, and Shannon is the only one who knows exactly how tough the Marshall is: judge, jury, and executioner, all wrapped up in one tidy package. As he explains to the faro dealer Elfrieda on page 33:

    Here’s where the title of the book comes in. From this point on, it’s a game of wits to determine who will prevail, Shannon or Cordell, and all bets are off in terms of which way this terse and concise hardboiled little novel will go.

   It gets a little choppy here and there — two cattle rustlers siding with Shannon are deposited in jail and never heard from again — but there’s a lot of tough action to go with some insightful perspective into the minds of the players.

   And the ending is doubly satisfying, quite ironic in terms of a man who, having succeeded once, follows it up by making what’s clearly a terribly wrong choice. Very nicely done, and it’s quite unexpected. If you’re a western fan, be on the lookout for this one.

[UPDATE] 07-30-11.   I have a feeling that the ending of this review was deliberately vague, so as not to any reveal significant plot points that I shouldn’t. Of course here it is, over eight years later, and I don’t remember the ending at all.

   No matter. I trust my judgment. I recommended the novel then, and I still do now.