The Caper of the Golden Bulls (William P. McGivern, 1966)

We are all familiar with the Spanish fiesta and the tradition of "running the bulls". But I'll bet you didn't know that this insanity runs for three days (at least the one in Pamplona does) and that each morning at six o'clock, the "race" starts with a couple of explosions detonated at the nearby river. The first one signals the runners that bulls had left the corral, and the next one informs them to better move their asses since bulls had formed something called encierro and are running towards them.

Our hero, Peter, did his homework and knows all about these things. And how can he not, since he used to be a legendary thief nicknamed Black Dove, famous for masterminding capers? Good old Black Dove is now a restaurant owner, but he is forced out of retirement by his ex-associate, Angela, who blackmails him into planning and executing the "one last job": stealing the priceless jewels from the bank located in the heart of the city of Pamplona. It's a monumental task, but he gets a tantalizingly amorphous idea and comes up with a plan that essentially involves blasting into the bank's vault with carefully timed explosions that coincide with those used in the ceremony.

Which makes sense, right? I mean, a drunken mob of several thousand can never tell the difference between the explosions that were set a few hundred meters (or more) apart. And both police and bank security staff are too stupid and incompetent to check the bank's premises every once in a while. But anyway, Peter seems to be so enthusiastic about this whole silly folklore that he even incorporates cabezudo into his plan. Cabezudos are, of course, those giant costumed figures with creepy faces, and master Peter gets one made to help him make a loot handover., Because you see, instead of taking a loot with him and handing it over to Angela later, it's much more convenient and risk-free to hand a bag full of diamonds to a giant costumed figure (with a creepy face) passing the bank's entrance precisely at the same time when the job is finished.

And yeah, after each explosion, he and his companeros must run along with the bulls...

Do I need to go on? Actually, I think I do, because it wouldn't be fair to finish this text without mentioning Peter's fiancée, Grace, who, herself, used to be some sort of an uber thief (her nickname was Black Diamond). Their romance scores the perfect 10 on a corny-meter (they keep calling each other "dear" and "darling"), which is terrible enough, but the really irritating stuff is 100+ pages where she doesn't waste a moment to annoy him to either abandon the whole thing or let her help him. And it typically goes like this:

Peter was shaken, not by her threats, but by her passion. With her slim strong legs spread wide, and the anger blazing purely in her eyes, she was like a creature struck from the ice and rock of mythology, proud, indomitable, fantastic.
"You are wonderful," he said simply. "Absolutely wonderful."

Do I still need to go on?

2.5/5

Facts:

Hero: 
Peter Churchman, ex-thief, now restaurant owner. It's not explicitly stated, but he took his last name after accidentally bombing a cathedral in Manchester during his WW2 days. So besides being an over-complicating thief, he's not much of a navigator either...

Location: 
Spain. Mostly in Pamplona, San Fermin where fiesta takes place. Plus southern Spain, where Peter lives, and there's also a short trip to Gibraltar.

Body count: 

1

Dames: 

Peter's fiancee Grace. A note from his diary:

She is tall as a silver beech tree. Bonfires of excitement blaze in her eyes. She is an orchestra of sex. Throbbing drums sounding the charge. Pinwheels of excitement flashing in the tympani. Bugles and trumpets screaming splendid abandonment. Violas (contra-bassoons?) sobbing the final surrender.

I did mention that this stuff is corny, didn't I?

There's also bitchy blackmailing Angela with an attitude, and I quite liked her, but unfortunately, asides from some poisonous remarks, she doesn't get much stage time.

Blackouts: 
There is one, and it's not bad at all:

The marble floor was cold against his cheek, and his limbs were filled with a shuddering impotence. And the darkness fell about him like the wings of a great black dove...

Good old darkness theme combined with a shuddering impotence. A bit crazy, but nevertheless quite original. Also, a nice touch to throw in his black dove nickname.

Title: 
It's half right (the caper) and half silly (no golden bulls in this one)

Edition: 
First Sphere Books, 1968

Cover: 
Cool and kind of sexy. To be honest, it's the main reason why I bought the book.

First time on this blog: 
Is it possible that this is actually the first "one last job" type of bank robbery on this blog?

Cool lines: 
Something hard prodded Peter's spine.
From behind him Blake said: "Take it nice and easy now. If you think this is a gun, go to the head of the class."

She said quietly: "This throws high and to the right. Francois, if you take another step towards me, I'll aim for the middle of your left thigh. I'm a good enough shot to put a very painful cloud over your technical qualifications to manhood." [Fatale]

Duel For Cannons (Dane Hartman, 1981)

Do not read this! Here's all you need to know about it:

Chapter 1: 
Texas sheriff Boris Tucker is killed in an amusement park in southern California while visiting it with his family. He was Harry Callahan's only friend. Because, you see:  

Harry’s definition of a friend was someone he didn’t know from his immediate job that he was willing to go and see. Otherwise he kept up a friendly banter with the guys at work and let the girls come to him when they both found time.

Chapter 2:
We are in San Fran now. Tucker's death has been covered up as a suicide, but we know better. And so does Harry!

Chapter 3:
Before Harry can dedicate his attention full-time to his late friend's case, he needs to solve the current serial rapist/murderer case he's been working on. Fortunately, the gods of incredible coincidences are on his side, as he runs into the perpetrators while having dinner in a nightclub. Shoots three and captures one.

Then he immediately takes off to LA, where another corpse confirms that he's on the right track. He also gets involved in a ridiculous chase on the studio lot, where they are shooting a western movie.

Chapter 4: 
It all added up to one thing; the hitman wanted Harry to come after him. Killing a friend, kidnapping a residential girl, leaving behind a stoolie-related clue, it was all part of his warped way to offend Callahan’s sensibilities.

Huh? Dirty Harry's sensibilities? At least his superiors have some sense left:

That sort of personalized logic fell on deaf ears. Neither Bressler nor his superiors could be convinced that Harry had a case.
Instead, Bressler was convinced Harry was working too hard that he was having paranoid delusions. He suggested Harry take a little time off. 

And naturally:

Harry agreed. On his own time and with his own money, the cop reserved a ticket to San Antonio, Texas. 

Upon his arrival in San Antonio, Harry's met by some street toughs and dirty cops. Also, the taxi drivers act very unfriendly, so:

Harry had figured that a powerful politico was behind it all along. Now, however, Harry had to amend his reasoning. Anyone powerful enough to mobilize the police, the street gangs, the redcaps, and the cabbies went beyond area politics. Harry admitted to himself that he was dealing with a power beyond that. A power of money. A power of business.

We learn that the villain is a "wetback made good", Edd Villaveda aka H.A. Striker and that his henchman is some John Wayne-obsessed psycho called Sweetboy Williams. We also get to know the good guy: Peter C. Nash, one of the few remaining good cops in San Antonio. Nash asks Harry to be his enforcer. Harry reluctantly agrees.

Chapter 5:
Not very eventful. Harry breaks up a dirty cops payoff deal. Also, a few cracks begin to show in Striker/Willams relationship, and the former decides to terminate the latter's employment. So there's a glimmer of hope that this will take a detour from the horribly formulaic direction it has taken.

Chapter 6:
Harry's second assignment as an enforcer. It goes wrong, and he's arrested. But gods of police stupidity (Strughold is so sure of himself that he leaves a .44 Magnum lying next to Harry) are kind to him, and he manages to escape. Riverboat chase follows, and Harry again manages to outsmart and outmanoeuvre his adversaries. The chapter is concluded simply with: It wasn’t easy, but he did it anyway.

Chapter 7:
It opens with Harry in the late Tucker's now-empty house, and the author doesn't even attempt to explain how he got there unnoticed. All wet with his clothes torn, wounded leg and - last but not least - by being fucking handcuffed!? I guess it wasn't easy, but he did it anyway...

Anyways, now our main man is really pissed off:

Harry’s depression was displaced by dark anger; the kind Harry used to fuel his life. It was a quiet, painless rage at all the injustices of civilization rolled together. It was a dark sense of realism. A feeling of reckless capability. Harry knew he had to do something.

The game was over, the playing had stopped, no more fooling around. Dirty Harry was taking over now.

He then calls Striker, and they arrange a time and place for the next shoot-out. Their conversation concludes with them both agreeing on Harry's mental state:

“You’re crazy,” said Striker. 
“Yes, I am,” Harry agreed.
 
The shoot-out follows in which "it was every bullet for itself", and Harry kills a bunch of bad guys, but unfortunately, this is still not a final act. We need to keep enduring this nonsense.

Chapter 8:
Harry fucks Peter's wife Carol. Very unexpected and a bit sneaky, too, since Peter is still alive! And check out his pathetic rationalisation:

But Harry would never talk about it. And Harry wasn’t analyzing it. And Harry wasn’t enjoying it. It went beyond anything like that. It was like the rest of his life. He was doing it because he thought it was right and he had to.

Then he manages to hack Peter's home computer by guessing the password (it is ".44 Magnum") and sets off to another shoot-out.

Chapter 9:
Final shootout:

Although he tried not to, he couldn’t help realizing that this was the biggest fight he had gotten involved with since World War II.
...
They had everything. As Harry threw open his door and dropped below the top of the sunken level, he saw AR-15 Sporters designed from the Colt M16, Ruger Mini-14, .223 carbines with twenty-round box magazines, thirteen-round, 9mm automatics, army forty-fives, and shotguns of all types.

Harry teams up (!!?!??) with Williams, and they kill Striker:

Striker’s head blew apart like a flower blossoming. The force of two .44 bullets burrowing into his skull at once all but decapitated him. Literal gouts of blood erupted from his neck like a scarlet fountain. Both men had to move back to avoid bathing in it.

Chapter 10:
By now, everyone's dead except Williams. He stages the one-on-one standoff with Harry in Alamo (ahem):

It was an absurd situation. Two men who hardly knew each other. Two men who had fought side by side. Two men who wanted more than anything else, to kill each other. Two men negotiating how they’d do it. If it wasn’t so deadly, it would be laughable.

And you do know who will come alive out of it, right?

The fucking finally end!

I could go on about why I think it's terrible, but the main reason is that it is simply fucking boring.

2/5

Facts:

Hero:
Inspector Harry Callahan - No, they didn’t call him Dirty Harry for nothing.

Location:
Fullerton, Southern California, San Francisco, LA, San Antonio, Alamo

Body count: 24

 
Not counting a poor sucker on whose head Harry throws a beer keg (with a noise that was reminiscent of the sound the gong made at the beginning of a J. Arthur Rank film).

Four cops go on Williams's account (Williams in action was astonishing), and there's probably another half dozen more killed by him in the last shoot-out (since he was doing the same thing as Harry). Also, not counting an unspecified number of explosion victims in that shoot-out.

Object of desire: 
Revenge, clearing his good (ahem) name, cleaning up the San Antonio police department

Dames:

/

Blackouts: 
Not sure if it counts, but there's a pretty (unintentionally?) comical scene in which Harry tries to set himself free of the handcuffs. You see, the problem is that his dear Magnum's barrel is too long to simply shoot the chain off, so instead, he unsuccessfully tries a bunch of different techniques, and one that involves a door, some bolt and a door ends up like this:

His skull slapped the bright floor tile, sending a starblaze across his eyes. He stared at the multicolored firework display of his mind while cringing on the floor. When his vision cleared, he was lying with his legs almost in the lotus position. He sat up without moving his legs. His vision clouded again and a little knife stabbed his brain a couple of times, but then the pain and the purple haze went away.
  

Title: 
See Striker's demise in chapter 9

Edition: 
First NEL Paperback Edition June 1982 

Cover: 
Clint with his favourite toy

Cool lines:  

Shannon didn't need much convincing. For a homicide detective, his demeanor was as bland as his face was handsome.

It was a beautiful weapon, which Harry knew how to use. Once some people knew how to ride a bike, they could ride any make or model. So it was with Harry and his handgun.[The Coolest!]

The Sometime Wife (Carter Brown, 1965)

This one opens with a pretty silly bit of wisdom:

The next best thing to having a rich, good-looking dame for a client is having a rich client.

It then proceeds to the most narcissistic main protagonist introduction I can remember. Along with a witty response which Oscar Wilde himself would be proud of:

"My name's Boyd," I told her. Then I gave her a look at my left profile, which is sheer perfection in itself, to bring a little glamour into her drab life. "Mr. Vanossa is expecting me."
"He's waiting in the library." She gave me a cold beady-eyed look. "And with a name like Boyd, you should be able to look people straight in the eye without twitching your head like that the whole time!"

So, the tone is set, and we now know better than to expect some ultra-hard-boiled stuff. Our sleuth in this one is Danny Boyd, and he is hired by some extravagant (sort of) upper-middle-class (kind of) asshole to find his missing wife. And his motive for bringing her back is pretty cool: since she has access to the household money, he wants to bring her home in time to pay the bills at the end of the month.

Which is cool. I like plots driven by simple vehicles. Of course, no simple missing person case remains just that for long in any crime novel. They sooner or later all turn into murders, and in this one, it is pretty soon - the body count meter starts rolling in the second chapter. From then on, the whole thing loses some of its intensity. You see, Danny's MO is a bit strange: he keeps changing his clients, and every new one points him to a fresh suspect. He wanders around, and instead of conducting some proper interviews, he keeps explaining what he knows to anyone willing to listen to him.

But since the man is a private detective, I still had a feeling that he knew what he was doing. I wasn't so sure once I came to this:
 
"Why are you taking me back there?"
"Because that's where it happened," I said. "Because whoever murdered Randolph wanted him dead, and you and Charlie didn't."
"What's that supposed to mean?" she snarled.
"I'm not too sure myself," I admitted. "That's why we're going back to the beach house to find out."

Whoever murdered Randolph wanted him dead!? I don't know how Bill Pronzini missed this one when he put together his two Gun in Cheek masterpieces.

Anyway, they reach the beach house where the whole cast is assembled, so the stage is ready for the final revelation. Don't like that Agatha Christie type shit at all, and just when I started to yawn, it happened! The best part of the book by far! The whole whodunit revelation drama thing goes spectacularly wrong. Danny is so incompetent that he fails to notice that not just one, but two of the bad guys are carrying guns. So they disarm him and then even start to plot some shit to make our hero a fall guy. Not sure how intentionally funny this is supposed to be, but I loved it. This is what I call an original twist! And don't worry - Danny will shoot his way out (although it's not explained how he managed to obtain a gun) and save the day.

It's an easy read, and with only 120 pages, this is a perfect book to take on a plane. Lots of charming craziness in it, and I would almost call it cute, but there are a few nasty (not needed at all) fags remarks, and our hero is kind of obnoxious every now and then. For fuck's sake - you don't get a girl drunk to fuck her!

3.5/5

Facts:

Hero: 
Danny Boyd, PI
 

"Oh no! This is hysterical, it really is! Don't tell me you're some kind of professional snooper, Boyd?"

"Private detective," I grunted. 

And he has this weird thing about his profile. Seems he tries this "tick" to impress every woman he runs into, and (hardly surprising) it never actually works:

"My name's Boyd - Danny Boyd." I gave her the profile, right then left, and kind of slow so she'd have plenty of time to appreciate it.

"You have a stiff neck?" The caution in her voice warmed into sickening sympathy. "It's the humidity."

Location:
New York City + several trips to Northport on Long Island.

Body count:  

3

Dames:
Mrs Karen Vanossa: She had a kind of tempestuous beauty, with smouldering dark eyes colored to match her hair, a straight nose, and a firm but strongly sensual mouth.

Nina North: She was in her early twenties, I figured; a blue-eyed blonde with the kind of hungover lower lip which said she knew what she wanted, while the upper lip had a slightly hesitant look like it agreed about that okay but was still surprised.

Mrs Randolph: She also had that indefinable something that a good maitre d' can spot at fifty paces, that combination of breeding, social position, and - best of all - money.

And I should probably also mention Danny's red-headed, green-eyed secretary Fran Jordan. They have some sort of Velda/Hammer relationship with lots of sexual innuendo around them, but it's all pretty silly, and she doesn't contribute much to the story. 

Blackouts: 
Not sure. There's a cool scene when the blonde volcano (=Nina) storms into Danny's apartment screaming "Snake-in-the-Village!" at him:

"I'll kill you!" she announced passionately. "I'll beat your brains out and feed them to the ducks on Central Park Lane!" [Fatale]

She cracks him across the nose with her purse, and then he trips over the rug (because rather than paying attention to the blonde volcano, he instead chooses to admire its sexy body) and nosedives across the floor:

I had a vague impression of a million little white balls flying over my head, then her knee stuck me in the shoulder. The rest was a combined blur of sound and sight, something like Cape Kennedy in miniature.

I'm not sure if this counts as a proper blackout, but I think it's worth mentioning. Snakes in the Village, ducks in Central Park!
 

Title: 
Don't really get it.

Edition:  
New English Library, Four Square Books, 1966. I couldn't find a scan of this edition's cover online, and I'm too lazy to create one, so I've used the Signet edition cover, which is practically identical.

Cover: 
It has to be Nina, since neither of the other two is blonde. And besides that, they both have small breasts (Karen's are high-peaked, and Mrs Randolph's are pointed with desire!). 

The illustration is not credited, but it's pretty obvious that its author is McGinnis. If nothing else, check out her unproportionally long left leg.

Cool lines:  
Maybe it wasn't his fault, I thought generously; maybe he came from a long line of kissing cousins who just kept right on marrying each other and Charlie was the end product.

"Didn't I tell you Karen is a nympho?"
"Not in so many words," I muttered. "It doesn't faze you any?"
"I find it somewhat of a relief," he said casually. "I hate any form of physical exercise."

"You've found Frederic!" Jane's face was suddenly animated again. "That's wonderful! Where's he?"
"Down at the beach," I told her. "To be strictly accurate, he's down in the beach."[The Coolest!]

A Killer is Loose (Gil Brewer, 1954)

This Brewer's pulp has no virgins or femme fatales. Instead, we have Ralph Angers - an eye surgeon specialist who only wants to build a hospital. He even has the exact blueprints of this hospital, and he carries them manically with him all the time. I say manically because he, in fact, is a maniac. The poor guy is a Korean war veteran who has suffered a nervous breakdown and now wanders around a small Florida town where he stumbles upon our hero, Steve. To be precise, it's the other way around since it is Steve who saves Doc's life and, by doing this (unknowingly), forms a bond between the two men. Which, in practical terms, means he becomes (a kind of) hostage who must follow the crazy doc on his killing spree.

It's fast-moving, told in real-time and totally unpredictable. Cool stuff, but unfortunately, it doesn't work all the time. Especially parts where the action takes place outside are not always totally believable. I mean - surely someone would have noticed a couple of guys walking around in the evening covered in mud with one of them carrying a gun in plain sight? But parts that take place indoors are excellent! Home invasion on Mrs Graham's house is a masterclass in tension escalation (reminded me to see Desperate Hours again), and the scene with that little girl alone in the big house repeatedly having to play "Dancing in the Dark" on the piano is the creepiest stuff I've read in a long time.

It's not exactly an in-depth study of mental illness, but it's not just another serial killer story either. I think it suggests that sometimes we need a bit of shock therapy to appreciate the things we have. Steve is an invalid, he's jobless and has his house under two mortgages, but once he embarks on this insane journey into the darkness with Angers, all he can think of is his wife delivering their baby. Nice.

4/5

Facts:

Hero: 
Technically, Steve is the hero. However, he continues to whine and complain, doing little to address the situation, instead repeating how hopeless it is. And sometimes even praying. Fucking praying! So I'll choose Dr Angers as the hero in this one.

Location: 
Some unnamed small town in Pinellas County, Florida

Body count: 
5, not counting the old man who was shot (but never confirmed as dead) after the accident and not counting a cop towards the end (who simply dropped after being shot). Btw, and for the record, I didn't feel too bad about that real-estate asshole.

Object of desire: 
To build a hospital where Dr Angers could perform eye transplantation surgeries.

Dames: 
Lillian, a former dancer from Seattle and now (involuntary) girlfriend of Dr Angers. There's also large-breasted and round-hipped Mrs Graham.

There are also a couple of appearances of Harvey Aldercook's woman. She is totally irrelevant to the story (I don't remember if we even get to know her name), so it is even more surprising how viciously she is presented:

She was an insult to the female gender, a short circuit in the voluptuous, tender woman flesh man dreams upon. She was one of these ash-blonde, bony, saucer-eyed, skull-grinning, jut-jawed, false-breasted, fake-fannied, angle-posing, empty-thighed in-betweens they stamp out like tin slats for Venetian blinds in some bloodless, airless underground factory to supply that increasingly bewildering demand for sexless models such as she for certain women’s fashion magazines, where they loll backward gaping and pinch-nostriled in tight red and silver sashes, over an old freshly varnished beer barrel, holding long skinny umbrellas, point down in a sand dune. Sometimes you see them swooning pipe-lidded, paper-pale over a swirling Martini in a triple-sized cocktail glass with their long fleshless golden-tipped claws clamped buzzard-like around the stem.

Blackouts: 

/

Title: 
Dr Ralph Angers is loose, and he is killing people.

Edition: 
eBook

Cover: 
Pretty cool, but it could be better. Angers' facial expression doesn't look particularly psychopathic. And he doesn't have a briefcase for his roll of blueprints.

Cool lines:  

The drunk down the bar lifted his head. "I'm alcoholic. Will somebody buy me a beer?"

The Luger was like a melting chocolate cake in my hip pocket. [The Coolest!]

Johnny Staccato (Frank Kane writing as Frank Boyd, 1960)

Damsel in distress saved by the knight in shining armour - pretty typical and formulaic P.I. pulp story. Slightly below average, to be honest.

The first thing that didn't seem right was a pretty lame motive for the initial killing. Doubtless, Les was an ultra-mega asshole and probably did deserve what he got... but is it possible that a radio DJ in the early 60s would be such an influential figure in show business that he could (and this guy actually did) make or break the careers of singers? I doubt it, even though he was the nation's number-one disc jockey.

The story is a bit flat. Although there is some action and Johnny tries hard to make something happen, everything is centred around a handful of suspects who, by some weird coincidence, had all visited our unfortunate DJ an hour or so before he was killed. Busy guy he was indeed.

The last little problem I had was the protagonist. Not that the author isn't trying, but Johnny simply doesn't come across as a likeable guy. He's full of himself, a macho guy (he gets laid twice) with a near-zero sense of humour (still he keeps grinning to everyone after delivering his "witty" one-liners) and some kind of a wanna-be artist (he plays the piano in a night club) with a sensitive soul.

But more importantly, he's not much of a detective either (he has hunches, and stuff is bugging him all the time), so it is pretty surprising when the NYPD and DA decide to hand him the case for 48 hours. Johnny's plan? Believe it or not, here it is: 

“So now I take the forty-eight hours you've given me and I try to retrace my steps to see if I can pick up what it is that's bugging me.”

But it's still okay. I quite liked it. There's a nostalgic feel of the 30s and 40s, and in that sense, it works great. Straight-forward plotting with clues leading our hero from point A to B and finishing in a staged round-up of all the suspects and (not very) surprising revealing twist. Dialogues are weak, but slang is cool, and some archaic expressions left me laughing out loud.

2.5/5

Facts:

Hero: 
Johnny Staccato P.I. - A smooth man on the ivories, hot on the trigger, and cool in a jam—he's the toughest private eye to hit America in a decade.

It took me some time to decipher that "ivories" bit (remember - he's a pianist). But finally managed to do it with a bit of help from the dictionary.

Location: 
New York:

As he walked past, little groups on the sidewalk in front of some of the places parted for him silently, from the doorways of others came a word of greeting. Some he returned, some he shrugged off. There was a lot to be desired, but in the last analysis, it was the Village. And to Staccato, the Village was home.

Body count:  

3

Object of desire: 
Sex for Johnny and Les, fame and money for Shelley and Delia, Johnny for Gabby, money for Mr Seymour

Dames: 
Shelley Carroll aka Snow Top:

She was tall, voluptuously built. Her blue-white hair complemented the deep tan of her face and bare shoulders. She wore a daringly decollete white satin gown that clung to the generous curves and seemed to be having difficulty restraining full, thrusting breasts. A small waist hinted at full hips and long legs concealed by the fullness of her skirt. Her mouth was a vivid, moist crimson slash in the cocoa color of her face.

Gabby:

Gabby swivel-hipped across the floor, the abbreviated skirt giving full play to her long shapely legs; the sheer blouse giving ample evidence that the magnificence of her facade needed no artificial support. 

Delia Moore:

She was short, but the sloppily tied kimono couldn't conceal the fact that her breasts were full, her hips well rounded.

Blackouts: 
Two of them. The first one is pretty plain with an evergreen black pool and exploding lights motives:

He never saw the blow that felled him. There was a whooshing sound, and lights exploded in the back of his head. He went to his knees, shook his head groggily in a desperate effort to dispel the black pool that was threatening to engulf him. A puddle of yellow light spilled onto the bedroom floor from the living room beyond. In it, he had a momentary impression of a man's black loafers with ornamental tassels. Before he could see more, the second blow slammed his face into the floor.

But the second one is a bit better. I liked that insect thing:

There was another roar from across the street. An insect stung Staccato on the side of the head. He heard the roar of thunder and his head started to spin. He was dimly aware of the sound of footsteps, a familiar voice that seemed miles away. He tried to focus his eyes on the doorway from which the shots had come, found his gun too heavy to lift. It seemed to drag him down. He was unaware that his face had hit the pavement.
 

Title: 
See 'hero'

Edition:  
eBook

Cover: 
see 'hero' and 'dames'

Notable cover blurbs: 
see 'hero'

Cool lines:  
[after having sex with Gabby]
"How do you feel, Johnny?" the redhead wanted to know.
"Like I wrestled an octopus. And lost."

“I heard what he said,” Waldo wagged his head. “I also heard they're saying they're going to shoot a man to the moon. That don't mean they know what they're talking about.”

Perchance to Dream (Robert B. Parker, 1991)

The style is okay, and there are a few moments of brilliance (see the hero and cool lines sections). However, sometimes I thought that Parker tried too hard to emulate Chandler and came up with some genuinely corny dialogue.

The problem is the story. Or lack of it... Marlowe basically breaks the case and finds the bad guys after the first ten chapters (and btw, they are pretty short in this one). And then, for some reason, he keeps calling Vivian, and she keeps whining, and the damn thing doesn't move anywhere. So Parker throws in some Chinatown-like water rights conspiracy nonsense that just doesn't make much sense either.

It's not good, but at least it's bearable. Unlike that abomination of Black-Eyed Blonde published last year.

2/5

Facts:

Hero: 
"You're a private detective," he said. He had one of those Hollywood elocution voices which has no real accent but sounds nearly British, especially if you haven't heard a real one. He sounded like a guy that recited bad poems on the radio.
"When I'm not polishing my yacht," I said.

Location: 
L.A. and fictitious (I think) Neville Valley, 200 miles north of L.A.

Body count:  
4, not counting the unfortunate kitten thrown out the open porthole into the sea by that asshole Simpson.

Dames:

Vivian, still beautiful with eyes nearly coal black and full of heat and a full lower lip that seemed specifically meant to be nibbled on. And still tough:

"I'm not as tough as I look, Marlowe," she said
"If you were as tough as you look", I said, "you'd probably have to be licensed." [Fatale]

And of course, horny and a bit kinky Carmen, still cute as a ladybug but far dumber, with the moral sense of an hyena.

Blackouts: 
Yes, no less than three of them:

...something erupted against the side of my head and the lights coalesced into a brilliant starburst and then blackness into which I slid as peacefully as a drunken seal.

Huh, drunken seal? The second one lacks this kind of imagination and is more or less limited to the use of a comparative (or is it superlative?) of the adjective red:

I couldn't breathe. The reddish haze got darker and redder and finally enveloped me and I plunged into it and disappeared.

The last one lacks any imagination at all. Pretty standard stuff:

Something hit the side of my head and I went back once again to a place I'd been spending too much time in.
 

Title: 
According to Wikipedia, it's another euphemism for dead.

Edition: 
Futura, 1991

Cover: 
She is definitely young Bacall, but the guy looks more like the dude who played Eddie Mars in The Big Sleep. Is it possible that the illustrator was given the wrong film still?

Cool lines: 

"This your car?" the fat cop said.
"Nice huh?" I said. "You want to sit in it?"
"What the hell's that supposed to mean?" the fat cop said.
"Sorry," I said. "I didn't mean to talk so fast."
"You'll be talking fast in the back cell under the big lights in a little while," the fat cop said.
"The smaller the town, the tougher the buttons talk," I said.[The Coolest!]

Pearls are a Nuisance (Raymond Chandler, 1950)

Checked this one out while reading Chandler's letters and watching again the brilliant HBO series with Powers Booth. It's a collection of three short stories and a seminal essay The Simple Art of Murder.

Pearls are a Nuisance (1939)

Not bad, but quite forgettable cosy buddy-buddy nonsense. Probably of interest to Chandler's scholars only.

Finger Man (original story 1934, rewritten with Marlowe in 1950)

Opens with Marlowe testifying against some badass mobster. Besides the killing he's accused of, this guy Manny also seems to have a history of shady dealings with "a big politico, a fixer". Some influential people would prefer Marlowe to stay away from the Grand Jury, and the DA advises him to watch his step. Our main man responds simply by saying "sure" and returns to his office, where he's met by a friend who hires him as a bodyguard for the forthcoming night.

So by the end of the first chapter, the setup is complete. And the two plots merge pretty soon, which is good - I don't like those predictable endings with "surprising" revealings of "unrelated" sub-plots. What follows is a standard classical PI story, featuring gamblers, corrupt politicians, tough guys, and amoral dames.

Good stuff. Also memorable for the first appearance of Bernie Ohls in the Marlowe story.

The King in Yellow (1938)

Royalty from the title is King Leopardi (what a great name!), a jazz bandleader whose wild party is broken up by our hero Steve Grayce, a hotel detective. King has an attitude that matches his "blue" blood and gives plenty of it to Steve:

"Leopardi does what he likes, where he likes, when he likes. Nobody's stopped him yet, gumshoe. Take the air." 
... 
"I never did like house peepers," he sneered. "They smell like public toilets."

He doesn't stop at verbal abuse. The asshole even takes a shot at our hero! So, no wonder Steve throws him out of the hotel. But instead of management's gratitude, he gets canned for mistreating VIP guests. Jobless now, he decides to join the ranks of private investigators, and his first assignment is offered to him practically by itself - when cleaning the room after his fight with Leopardi, he finds a blackmail note in King's wastebasket.

It does take its time to get things going, but I really liked this intro. The story then progresses nicely, introducing some colourful characters (with even crazier names, such as Dolores Chiozza and Jumbo Walters), and everything concludes with an excellent, very surprising ending centred around a family tragedy. I could sense it coming with the old, broken couple and the blind man crying. The sad world indeed is the world of Raymond Chandler, but you enjoy every moment of it.

5/5 [anything written by the Master will always get five stars on this blog]

Facts:

Hero: 
We all know everything about Marlowe, but who is Steve Grayce, the (ex) hotel detective?

Steve frowned at the gun and didn't move. The big man looked him over. "You're tough," he said. "I been in the ring long enough to size up a guy's meat. You're plenty hard, boy. But you ain't as hard as lead. Talk it up fast."

Location: 
L.A.

Body count: 
None in Perils, 8 in Finger Man (half of them are related to the Manny Tinnen affair) and 7 in King

Blackouts: 

There's a pretty funny one in Perils:

I bent over and took hold of the room with both hands and spun it. When I had it nicely spinning I gave it a full swing and hit myself on the back of the head with the floor. This made me lose my balance temporarily and while I was thinking about how to regain it a wet towel began to slap at my face and I opened my eyes.

And a more proper one in Finger Man when Marlowe gets "coshed" from behind:

Then he dropped the cigarette and stopped on it and a quick, light step made faint noise behind me. I was far too late turning.
Something swished and I went out like a light.
 

Edition:  
Pan, 1980

Cover: 
Frank Dorr from Finger Man scratching his black Persian cat Toby.

Notable cover blurbs: 
This one, coming from the Daily Telegraph, is a bit old-fashioned but still pretty cool:
"...As tense as a tiger springing into action."
 

Cool lines:  
Obviously, since Chandler and Hammett invented the hard-boiled language, there's no shortage of cool lines, and below are just a few:

He had beautiful teeth, but they hadn't grown in his mouth.[The Coolest!] 

He took out a leather keyholder and studied the lock of the door. It looked as if it would listen to reason.

She had a mud-coloured face, stringy hair, grey cotton stockings - everything a Bunker Hill landlady should have. She looked at Steve with the interested eye of a dead goldfish.

But super cool stuff comes from The Simple Art of Murder essay. The whole thing is available online here. I just pasted a small example of its brilliance:

There is plenty of that kind of social and emotional hypocrisy around today. Add to it a liberal dose of intellectual pretentiousness and you get the tone of the book page in your daily paper and the earnest and fatuous atmosphere breathed by discussion groups in little clubs. These are the people who make bestsellers, which are promotional jobs based on a sort of indirect snob-appeal, carefully escorted by the trained seals of the critical fraternity, and lovingly tended and watered by certain much too powerful pressure groups whose business is selling books, although they would like you to think they are fostering culture. Just get a little behind in your payments and you will find out how idealistic they are.