Shaft Among the Jews (Ernest Tidyman, 1972)

Let's break down this using the classical three-act dramatic structure.

The setup/intro doesn't exactly start with a bang. We find John sulking and bitching about his poorly decorated office (don't ask - It's a price of pussy). It's not very promising, and it leans more towards some pretty corny soft-core porn instead of a hard-boiled crime I had expected. But funny nevertheless, just check out these:

- "Mr Shaft, did anyone ever tell you you are built like a brick shithouse?" 
- "Don't fondle me, darling. I don't need it. I've been wet for you since I looked at you at the party. And thought of you inside me."
- "You have a beautiful penis."

After Shaft's character (and the beauty of his penis) has been established (in case we forgot how bad-ass he/it was), he gets hired by a group of Jewish diamond dealers, and we enter the second act, the "action/tension rising" one. And this one also doesn't exactly work, at least not right away. The whole assignment is a bit vague - someone has been knocking off diamond merchants, and Shaft (the schvartze) is simply supposed to "be poking around, making dishonest man nervous". His employers don't even bother giving him some decent clues. They merely drop the name of "soon-to-be the main villain" to him. Not much explanation is given, simply that "Something's not right... something is not kosher with Morris Blackburn".

So this is not a classical mystery case, and our hero cannot really start any proper investigation. At least none of the usual ones, as they are described in Detectives for Dummies. So he decides to go undercover as a janitor at the building where the villain works. And at that point, I must admit I really started to wonder where this mess was leading to. But we are still around page 50, and it gets better and better from here on. The plot thickens nicely as an old doctor, with a secret formula and a beautiful daughter, is thrown into the mix. Plus Israeli special agents, plus a local dirty cop, plus a corrupt and immoral diamond merchant, together with his hitman.

Third act - the resolution phase? Total fucking shoot-out with Sten guns (which are Uzis, I think) and even a rocket launcher(!) resulting in a bunch of corpses. Case fucking solved and closed. Shaft is now rich, and he also scores with our damsel in distress.

And that's it, basically. Reminded me a bit of Spillane's Goliath Bone. I'm aware that it's not a fair comparison, but they are both violent and sexy and dealing with some truly ridiculous plots (dreams of a million alchemists are fulfilled in this one) involving Israel and world domination. But I remember reading Goliath Bone just made me sad for the old maestro, while reading Shaft was pure fun.

3.5/5

Facts:

Hero:
John Shaft, PI

Location:
New York

Body count: 
7 real people and 6 diamond salesmen

Dames:
Amy Taylor-Davis - She had a Maserati gearbox built into her pelvis, five forward gears, two reverse. [Fatale]

Cara Haze, the complete antipode of Amy - pure, innocent, lost, shy, etc. Shaft, of course, fucks her too:  "He entered her slowly, watching her face. They gazed at each other in a silent communion...."

I expected their paths to eventually cross, and there's a perfect opportunity for that when Shaft needs to hide Cara in a safe place. He takes her to his apartment, but in my opinion, that was a pretty stupid move since the bad guys knew exactly where he lived. Wouldn't it be wiser to take her to his lover's place? True, he would be unable to do the "silent communion" with her, but at least she'd be safe.

After the intense and impressive introduction, Amy gradually fades out of the picture. Which is a shame because I liked her. And there's another dame with great potential mentioned briefly, but left forgotten immediately after. Cherry Culp, as you can tell from the hilarious description below, would be a great addition to the colourful cast of characters:

She seldom saw her husband, of course, and he demonstrated his gratitude for that deliverance with continuing, unquestioning financial support and a recognition of the fact that she was utterly worthless as a human apart from her efforts at keeping the economy strong as a continuous circulator of currency. [Fatale]

Blackouts: 
Yep, even Shaft is not tough enough to take two bullets and not pass out.

Title: 
Great title, a bit politically incorrect if you ask me, but definitely way cooler than "Shaft in Little Odessa" or "Shaft Among Diamonds" or some shit like that.

Cover: 
A cool illustration of Shaft being surrounded by babes and bad guys. Very 70s.

Cool lines:  
Shaft was still playing the outraged innocent. He sounded about as sincere as a cab driver giving thanks for a bent dime.[The Coolest!]

When you bought Shaft, you bought his anger.[The Coolest!]

If he had a choice at that moment between getting laid and standing there in the shower with a drink in his hand, he'd go for the shower. A piece of ass is a piece of ass, but a hot shower is also a place to think, drink, urinate, pick your nose unobserved, and wash away the smell of your prejudices.

Israel. Nobody came from Israel. That was where everybody went for a nineteen-day tour or to live and kick an occasional Ay-rab in the ass.

"Why don't you get a haircut?" Shaft snarled. "You look like a broad from the Bronx who used to give the best head in the Village."
"Prick," Berkowitz said.
"That's what she wanted. But I don't need a blow job now, so get the fuck out of here."

Shaft's Big Score! (Ernest Tidyman, 1972)

Begins with Shaft returning home to Brooklyn from his vacation in Jamaica, which is a bit odd. I mean, he did visit the Caribbean, but that was two years later in Carnival of Killers. But let's not split any hair over this; we don't really expect these pulpy novels to be very consistent, do we?

And this one is as stereotypical as they come. After 10 pages, the stage is set - his good friend murdered, leaving behind a hot widow and a shitload of hidden money over which two rival gangs (blacks and Italians, of course) will fight mercilessly. And with a few horny dames thrown into this pot, there's our hero in the middle of it, trying to save his friend's honour and missing cash.

Cops are, of course, totally disinterested and incompetent. After the initial killing, they simply conclude that "this was a professional hit and it wasn't the last one". Which I found a bit odd because blowing up the entire building's floor to kill a single guy (not even a mobster!) doesn't seem very professional to me. But again, it's a Shaft novel, and we shouldn't try to make much sense of this black and white, violent world. It's better to just let it ride and enjoy such little nonsense. My favourite one was towards the end when just two (?) bad guys are chasing our main man, who's, btw, armed with a shotgun (!) It's evident that these two suckers are no match for "two hundred pounds of meat and meanness", so why the hell are they chasing him and not the other way around? Maybe because "the lessons of escape were bred into his bones"? Anyways, when they do manage to "corner" him, he simply shoots both of them. The end.

Of course, it's more about the style than the content, but still Mr. Tidyman could try a bit harder on the story aspect. It reads more like a screenplay (maybe that's the reason for the chase mentioned above), which can actually be the case here because IMDB doesn't state that the movie is based on the book, so maybe it was published after the movie came out.

Anyway, it's a fun read with great dialogues, cool slang, and some hilarious one-liners. But it does get a bit repetitive and dull towards the end as there's a 100+ page gap between the initial killings and the final bloodbath.

2.5/5

Facts:

Hero: 
John Shaft, PI - Just under two hundred pounds of meat and meanness ... A man in motion, moving almost as quickly as his mind.

Location:
NYC, mostly in Queens, where "It is is easier to get a cab than a cop. The cabs either have a better radio system or they are more eager to get the work"

Body count: 

9

Dames: 
Arna, the widow. Gail Sharrett, daughter of a mobster kingpin. Rita Towne, the mistress of another mobster kingpin. 

The latter one is a nymphomaniac (deep pit that could never be filled, a fire that could never be cooled) who fucks Shaft, and it's a pretty funny fuck too because our main man just cannot satisfy her. So after the intercourse, he simply concludes that "If he could have unscrewed his cock he would have given it to her to play with." He also tries to give her some advice, to which she simply responds by saying, "Don't talk. Fuck." [Fatale]

Blackouts: 
Two - on the first occasion he gets knocked off by the explosion, but second one is a more proper because he gets beaten to a pulp.

Title: 
A bit silly, but on the other hand, well aligned with the exploitation genre. Also inaccurate, because I have no idea what Shaft was supposed to score. Rita Towne doesn't really count, and he gives recovered money back to Arna so she can establish a fund for crippled kids and build a school for them. Also, not sure wtf is about that exclamation mark at the end?

Cover: 
My paperback is the first UK publication from 1972, and they didn't even bother with some original artwork for the cover. Just used a movie poster with Richard Roundtree, which is, of course, totally understandable - you can't get much better advertisement than that.

Cool lines:
"Say goodbye to your fucking empty head," Shaft told him. "I don't need it any more." [The Coolest!]


"Got another back there?" he asked the pudgy stewardess, holding up the plastic glass at her. She smiled the pudgy little smile. Did the pilots have to wind them up before each trip? Could she hold that smile as an engine fell off?"Here you are, sir. Scotch on the rocks." The voice had all the sincerity of a radio commercial for hemorrhoid ointment and the girl would probably smile all the way through a blow job. [The Coolest!]


He could see how nervous Kelly was getting. He was jumping like a broad with a sniff of coke on her clit. [The Coolest!]

Mascola didn't answer. He lay stretched out beside Cal's coffin. The right side of his head was missing. A coroner would say there had been probable brain damage before death. [The Coolest!]

"My car or yours?" Gail Sherrett asked coldly as they waited for the elevator.
"Mine's yellow," Shaft said, "with a build-in meter."

Shaft's Carnival of Killers (Ernest Tidyman, 1974)

I'm not a diehard film buff when it comes to exploitation movies, but I like them enough to feel a bit embarrassed to admit that this is my very first Shaft novel. And to be even more honest, I wasn't even aware that those cool movies were based on books. I've seen old Shaft paperbacks occasionally in second-hand shops and flea markets, but they were always the "filmed" ones. The babes pictured on the front cover of this one obviously caught my attention. I decided to check out its back cover, and it was really a no-brainer to take it home, expecting good fun and easy reading.

And got both of these, but was also pleasantly surprised by how good and somehow original this stuff actually is, especially in terms of style.

It begins like a classic crime novel. Shaft is enjoying his vacation on the Jamaican beach (where there's absolutely fucking nobody), having his first can of the Red Stripe six-pack, but it doesn't take long until he's disturbed by the screaming girl being chased by a couple of thugs. But unlike Mike Hammer, he doesn't give a shit about it. In fact, he finds the whole scene just "lot better than any shit on television".

He does get involved, though, and at that point, I was expecting to get just another standard case of a runaway girl involved in the same shady business (drugs, porn flicks, blackmail, ... you choose) with Shaft helping her out. You know, it's just something to do to stay in shape and kill an hour or two while he's enjoying his holidays.

Well, I couldn't be further from the truth. Because in no time at all, our main man is involved in some sinister assassination plot against the prime minister. The plot thickens, and the characters are introduced at the speed of light. There are beautiful women (obviously), corrupted officials, gambling mafia guys (I think), tough policemen, car chases, some fanatical revolutionaries, bombs, ex-FBI operatives turned private investigators, attack dogs, etc, etc. Not to mention insane taxi drivers! In fact, the plot gets complicated so much that pretty soon (6th chapter), even Shaft gets a bit confused and needs to do a little recapitulation and facts re-evaluation. But he basically just confirms what he already knew: "Suddenly it was politics, not pussy."

Cool stuff, but style is definitely the winner over the content here. It is hilarious to read because Shaft is simply the coolest bad-ass motherfucker. And not at all in the cartoonish way in which he was presented in the movies, here he is much more made of flesh and blood. More vulnerable (see facts) and - big surprise - not much of a ladies' macho-man either (see facts again). He's just this nice guy, almost of the Lebowski kind, who wants to spend some quality time on his hard-earned vacations...

Language is great, too. Full of slang and cool jokes, but at the same time, it all seems natural and not forced at all. I wouldn't be surprised to find out that Mr Tidyman spoke this kind of street slang in his private life. Very funny and also easy to follow.

Liked it a lot and will definitely check out some other titles - "Shaft Among the Jews" sounds crazy enough, doesn't it?

4/5 (adding an extra half-point for a cool ending)

Facts:

Hero:
John Shaft, PI in NYC, but just a tourist in this one

Location:
Jamaica - between Kingston and Montego Bay

Body count: 

5

Most of them are disposed of in a way that would make Mike Hammer blush. And while speaking of these methods, I should probably add another corpse to the grand total. Because there's this pathetic hunchbacked criminal, and Shaft (1) jams the flashlight into his eye, then (2) tortures him by stepping on his ankle and twisting it until he gets a confession, and (3) finally snaps his neck by driving a car over the poor bastard. I don't think he actually kills him because later, a policeman mentions that "he had crippled somebody", and Shaft himself concludes his work by saying that "If he tried again with the blowgun, it would be from a wheelchair"

The body count is also not accurate and complete unless I add a couple of birds to it. There's a scene where he shoots another asshole, and the unfortunate guy's body falls into some kind of birdcage containing two vulture birds. Shaft doesn't like them, so he just shoots them, too.

Dames:

1. Marita Dawes - secretary and some kind of revolutionary (A dumb little broad with a nice ass but no brains involved in all this political bullshit)
2. Sarah Watson - the prime minister's ex-lover
3. Bernadette Lightwood - the prime minister's wife
4. Linda + Valerie - school teachers from New Jersey

But - amazingly! - Shaft doesn't fuck any of them. In fact, the one-night-stand affair with the latter two ends up pretty miserable, even humiliating for our main man (see below)

Blackouts: 
No less than three times. This is amazing, considering how tough he is supposed to be and also how short this novel is (130 pages). And while the first time is understandable (poisonous dart) and the second time tolerable (car crash), the last time is simply unacceptable! He picks up two horny housewives in a hotel bar and brings them up to his room, and they start drinking champagne. True, he is tired (but still horny!), but all this time, he's been nervous about what to do because he has never been in a threesome. One of the chicks saves him from this dilemma by jumping on top of him from behind, which makes him - well, you've guessed it - lose his consciousness one more time. 

Title: 
There's no shortage of killers, and I guess the carnival part comes from the costume party at the end. 

Cover:
No surprises here: Shaft & Babes. Cool, but it could be better to give the babes some guns.

Cool lines:  
It was black as a loan-shark's sympathy for delay.[The Coolest!]


The night was as dark as a pimp's soul. [The Coolest!]


She was a cold, dry fish, and he took a petty satisfaction in understanding why the Prime Minister had been baking bread in a hotter oven.[The Coolest!]


"Paw Paw Tree in West Kingston," the driver shouted. "No worse place than this. You not careful, they kill you for dollar."
"That's inflation," Shaft said. "In New York, they'll do it for fifty cents."

"What's your name, man?"
"David Michaelangelo," the bartender said.
"Jesus," Shaft muttered.
"You know my brother?"
I got to get out of here, Shaft thought.[The Coolest!]


They rammed their way through the crowded downtown area without accident. Shaft couldn't understand why, except that God probably loved Freddy [Taxi Driver] as an idiot. By all rights, there should have been three or four pedestrians and a couple of motor scooters draped over the front fenders.