Thu 13 May 2010
Reviewed by William F. Deeck: JONATHAN LATIMER – The Fifth Grave.
Posted by Steve under Reviews[15] Comments
William F. Deeck
JONATHAN LATIMER – The Fifth Grave. Popular Library #301, paperback original; 1st US printing, 1950. Methuen, UK, hardcover, 1941, as Solomon’s Vineyard. Magazine appearance: Mystery Book Magazine, August 1946. Reprinted several times, including: Jonathan Press #J65, digest-sized paperback, 1950s; International Polygonics, pb, 1988; Neville, hardcover, 1982: limited edition, 300 copies, 26 additional bound in leather; first unexpurgated US edition. (Each of the latter two editions were entitled Solomon’s Vineyard. Note that the IPL paperback is also unabridged.)
Although The Fifth Grave was published in 1946 in Mystery Book Magazine, the Popular Library edition is the first US printing in book form.
Some British spellings in the Popular Library edition lead to the surmise that Mystery Book Magazine used the British edition but edited it so that it would seem more current — there is a 1946 date in the novel that couldn’t have been in the 1941 edition — and then Popular Library copied the novel directly from the magazine.
Karl Craven, who does not live down to his name, arrives in Paulton, which apparently is somewhere in the Missouri wine country (Wine? Missouri?), to remove a young lady from the clutches of a religious cult, a cult whose raison d’etre, other than controlling the gambling, liquor, and prostitution in the area, is unclear.
Craven’s partner, Oke Johnson, had arrived in town earlier and is shot with a silenced rifle the night Craven shows up. Craven has to complete his assignment before he can take time to find out who killed Johnson, not that he cares a great deal:
“But I had to get the guy who shot him. It would be swell to have people point me out as the private detective who wasn’t bright enough to find his partner’s murderer.”
So much for good old Oke.
Wiliness and cunning, and 240 pounds, are what Craven has going for him. Luckily, the bad guys, who are numerous even outside the cult, are less intelligent than he is. He attains his ends by playing the baddies off against each other. And he uses and abuses the Princess, a prominent person in the cult and, of course, gorgeous.
The Princess’s primary interests are in beating and being beaten by Craven before sex and accumulating enough money so that she can leave the cult and live in comfort. Her brains, therefore, are mostly not in her head.
A hearty eater and an even heartier drinker, Craven also has a fondness for pulp detective stories and the brassiere ads in movie magazines. Add to that his own code of honesty, leavened with immorality, and a complex character is produced.
Update a few items, make the sex and language more explicit, and the novel would fit right in in today’s literature. It would also be better than most.
Editorial Comments: Not included in this review are some introductory comments and speculations Bill made concerning the origins of this novel. For a lengthy appraisal of Jonathan Latimer’s fiction by John Fraser, including a complete bibliography, go here on the primary Mystery*File website.
Disclaimer by Karl Craven found at the front of the Methuen edition:
“Listen. This is a wild one. Maybe the wildest yet. It’s got everything but an abortion and a tornado. I ain’t saying it’s true. Neither of us, brother, is asking you to believe it. You can lug it across to the rental library right now and tell the dame you want your goddam nickel back. We don’t care. All HE done was write it down like I told it and I don’t guarantee nothing.”
Reviewed previously on this blog:
The Lady in the Morgue (by Curt Evans)
May 13th, 2010 at 10:51 pm
This version is supposed to be notoriously abridged and censored from the original and later editions, but not having read this edition I don’t know exactly what the cuts were. Latimer, in particular seems to have suffered in his paperback reissues well into the 60’s from censorship and expurgation, both sex and racial comments.
But only having read the originals or later reprints I don’t know what the cuts were in this and other Latimer novels. Anyone know how extensive the cuts were.
May 13th, 2010 at 11:46 pm
I’m going to correct the credits to add that the Polygonics edition is also unabridged. The Neville limited edition is pricey, but the IPL paperback can be found for not a lot of money.
So the uncensored version is available, but given that, like you, I’m not able to say what cuts were made in either the magazine or Popular Library editions.
I have a feeling that some of the introductory material in the Neville edition goes into that, but my copy is temporarily out of sight — although I believe I know where it should be.
I’ll look for it and if I can locate it and no one has responded in the meantime, I’ll report back later.
— Steve
May 13th, 2010 at 11:54 pm
Two other reviews of this book everyone might want to check out are here:
http://therapsheet.blogspot.com/2009/09/book-you-have-to-read-solomons-vineyard.html (Mike Ripley)
and here:
http://jamesreasoner.blogspot.com/2009/01/forgotten-books-solomons-vineyard.html (James Reasoner)
May 14th, 2010 at 7:52 am
I have the Blackmask reprint of the Popular Library edition and the 2006 Resurrectionary Press edition SOLOMON”S VINEYARD, which i understood to be unedited. I figured if there was an edited section it would be the “rough sex” of chapter nine. I just compared the two and found no difference. Makes me wonder if the RP version is cut. I always thought it was original text.
May 14th, 2010 at 9:01 am
This is a terrific book, Steve! Maybe Latimer’s best.
May 14th, 2010 at 9:47 am
I’ve found my copy of the Neville hardcover, but it wasn’t of any particular assistance in terms of pinpointing any specific changes. I remembered that wrong.
I have just posted Art Scott’s review of THE FIFTH GRAVE, though, taken from Pronzini and Muller’s 1001 MIDNIGHTS. What he did that’s useful is include the first lines of both the original version and the edited Pop Library edition. As you can see, there’s quite a bit of difference.
Frank, you should be able to use this as a guide as to which version it was that Resurrectionary Press published.
George, I think you can tell from Art’s review that he agrees with you. I’ve read only the Pop Library paperback, and even so I agree with you too.
— Steve
May 14th, 2010 at 10:10 am
Steve … Based on that first line, both the BlackMask and the Resurrectionary Press editions are original text.
May 14th, 2010 at 11:08 am
I’m a tad confused, though. Blackmask uses a scanning method of getting the text ready for printing (I forget the precise term), and since they used the old Popular edition cover, i would assume they used that text. So, with the first line being “original” I guess the conclusion is the Popular edition of old was unedited. Is that correct?
May 14th, 2010 at 12:15 pm
Frank
Blackmask may have used the Popular Library cover, but the PL paperback itself does indeed start with the edited sentence that ends with “hot dame” rather than “good in bed,” as it was in the original.
It took me a while to find my PL edition, but now that I have, I can start to do some comparisons between it and the uncut version.
I have some other projects I’m working on that need to be finished up first, so it won’t be right away, but it’s high on my To Do list!
— Steve
May 14th, 2010 at 12:46 pm
Interesting. I’d like to have a good clean edition of the book. Both the Blackmask and the Resurrectionary Press are loaded with scanning errors. Not wanting to slam anyone, but in the front of the RP edition you’ll find this note from the publisher:
Pure Pulped Classix is a garishly named effort on the part of Resurrectionary Press to provide works of pulp fictions in editions that are cleanly designed and properly typeset.
As we all know, the Blackmask line of books is loaded with errors. When i first read the RP blurb, i figured it was a jab at BM and expected an error-free read. To the contrary, i found and noted 26 errors. Other than that, the book was cleanly designed and laid out. But, geez, I expected more.
Perhaps I’m being too harsh. I’m sure the publishing business is brutal and if scanning a book for typesetting enables a small profit to be made, and the publisher to stay in business, then what’s a few errors? When it comes to old classics, I usually seek out an early edition first, and if one is not available or is too expensive, I’ll buy a Blackmask or one of the other new editions. Better to read the book with errors than not read it at all.
May 14th, 2010 at 1:44 pm
There’s a copy of the International Polygonics paperback on ABE in VG condition for less than $15. According to the cover (see above), it’s the unedited version, and IPL paperbacks are really solidly built. Almost all of them still have white pages, even after 20 years. In this case, I’d say that’s the one to have.
— Steve
May 14th, 2010 at 4:54 pm
I’m on it. Thanks, Steve.
May 14th, 2010 at 10:41 pm
I’ve a got a copy of the Neville, but the IPL, like all their books, is a small prize in and of itself.
I wonder if the apparently extensive changes in the text for this and other Latimer books is a partial explanation why so many hard boiled classics never had much representation in the paperbacks. Many, like Latimer’s books, probably needed extensive rewrites to be more politically correct, though it is amusing that in the era of Mickey Spillane writers like Latimer had to be censored.
We think in terms of the raunchy paperbacks, but apparently they weren’t as raunchy as much of what went before.
May 15th, 2010 at 11:41 am
It’s interesting to compare books from different periods and see how they reflected the mores and values of their times. Back in the 50s, the works of “sleaze” authors like Orrie Hitt and Don Elliott and others were considered risque, back alley kinda stuff. Read them today, and they are incredibly tame. Jump ahead forty and fifty years and mainstream authors like Nora Roberts and Linda Howard (just to name a couple) can be incredibly explicit in their sex scenes. Yet, it is all accepted. You can carry those books around and read them anywhere in public, and no one gives you a second thought. I imagine back in the 50s, if you read a Midwood or Nightstand book, you did so in private.
May 15th, 2010 at 8:45 pm
Frank
Times have changed all right!
— Steve