Injury

On Monday I was out riding my bicycle and I had an accident. I was riding on a shoulder to let a car pass and ran over a deep rut. I went flying and landed on my right shoulder and broke my collar bone. I spent over four hours in Lutheran Hospital. I will not be riding my bike for 4 to 6 weeks. Since I am right handed it is difficult to do anything. The posting might be few and far between and very short (I don't like to finger type).

Crime Fiction Alpabet 2012: Letter K

This week over at Kerrie's spot at Mysteries in Paradise we are on the Letter "K" for her 2012 Edition of the meme Crime Fiction Alphabet. My contribution will be.......

Crime Fiction Alphabet: K is for Frank Kane

Frank Kane was born in Brooklyn in July 1912, and by the time he was 19, he had graduated from New York City College, earning a BS. He attended St. John's Law School, but prior to graduating, his first daughter was born. He was told  "better get a job and get some money pretty quick!" So he left law school and began to put his writing skills to use. He served a couple of years as a columnist for the New York Press, was Editor-in-Chief for the New York Trade Newspapers Corporation, and an associate editor for the New York Journal of Commerce. He also worked in public relations, as an advocate and spokesperson for the Liquor Industry. He apparently spent time on "the hill," in D.C., working with government officials to end the prohibition of consumption of alcohol. He did much work with the liquor industry throughout his career. After World War II, he returned to public relations, as well as freelance writing, and later, radio and television production. His writing for a New York newspaper led to a syndicated Broadway column called New York From Dusk To Dawn, which profiled Hollywood movie stars visiting New York. The column was later made into a radio show, on which Kane featured popular movie personalities. He went on to pen scripts for some of the most popular radio programs on the air, including six years as the writer for The Shadow. Kane went on to write for a multitude of radio programs. In the detective-adventure genre, he spent three years writing Gang Busters. He also wrote for Counter Spy, The Fat Man, Casey, Crime Photographer, Mr. Keen, Tracer of Lost Persons, The Lawless Twenties and Nick Carter, Master Detective. He also created Call the Police for Lever Brothers, and created, wrote and produced Claims Agent for NBC, which was based on Kane's character, Jim Rogers. And in 1947, Frank Kane was selected to write the Coast Guard documentary You Have To Go Out, starring Robert Young. But it was as the author of mystery novels about the adventures of Liddell that Kane was best known. Kane's first novel, About Face, placed detective Johnny Liddell in Hollywood to solve the murder of an ex-racketeer who became a power in the movie industry. The book could have been taken from the front pages of the newspapers at the time (1947), except that the novel was written months before the Bugsy Siegel murder. His novels, under his own name, and the pseudonym of Frank Boyd, sold multi-millions of copies in hard cover and paperback, and were translated into more than 17 languages. In the 1940's, '50's, and '60's, Kane wrote between close to 40 books, most featuring Johnny Liddell. He also claimed Liddell was the hero of more than 400 short stories featured in top detective magazines such as Manhunt, The Saint Detective Magazine, Private Eye and Pursuit. 

The Novels

·  About Face (1947, aka "Death About Face," " The Fatal Foursome"; Johnny Liddell)

·  Green Light For Death (1949; Johnny Liddell)

·  Slay Ride (1950; Johnny Liddell)

·  Bullet Proof (1951; Johnny Liddell)

·  Dead Weight (1951; Johnny Liddell)

·  Bare Trap (1952; Johnny Liddell)

·  Poisons Unknown (1953; Johnny Liddell)

·  Grave Danger (1954; Johnny Liddell)

·  Red Hot Ice (1955; Johnny Liddell)

·  A Real Gone Guy (1956; Johnny Liddell)

·  Key Witness (1956)

·  The Living End (1957; Johnny Liddell)

·  Syndicate Girl (1958)

·  Trigger Mortis (1958; Johnny Liddell)

·  Liz (1958)

·  Juke Box King (1959; Mickey Denton)

·  The Line-Up (1959; novelization of the TV series)

·  Trial by Fear (1959)

·  The Flesh Peddlers (1959; by Frank Boyd)

·  A Short Bier (1960; Johnny Liddell)

·  Time To Prey (1960; Johnny Liddell)

·  Johnny Staccato (1960; novelization of the TV series; by Frank Boyd)

·  Due Or Die (1961; Johnny Liddell)

·  The Mourning After (1961; Johnny Liddell)

·  Dead Rite (1962; Johnny Liddell)

·  Crime Of Their Life (1962; Johnny Liddell)

·  The Conspirators (1962)

·  Ring-a-Ding-Ding (1963; Johnny Liddell)

·  Hearse Class Male (1963; Johnny Liddell)

·  Johnny Come Lately (1963; Johnny Liddell)

·  Barely Seen (1964; Johnny Liddell)

·  Final Curtain (1964; Johnny Liddell)

·  Fatal Undertaking (1964; Johnny Liddell)

·  The Guilt Edged Frame (1964; Johnny Liddell)

·  Esprit De Corpse (1965; Johnny Liddell)

·  Two To Tangle (1965; Johnny Liddell)

·  Maid In Paris (1966; Johnny Liddell)

·  Margin For Terror (1967; Johnny Liddell)

The Dead Are Discreet by Arthur Lyons

Introducing Jacob Asch

On a weirdly twisted trail of satanic sex and savage death

California is his territory.
His time is very much today.
And the evil that men and women do is his often painful business.

The Dead Are Discreet begins when Asch opens up a closed case of murder. And lifts the lid off a bubbling cauldron of kinky sex, satanism, porno movie-making, blackmail, and the ugly, ugly secret of beautiful people. By the time he peels illusion down to the bone truth, even grotesque death seems mild compared to the living hell born when flesh and the devil join in an unholy alliance.

Printing History
Written by Arthur Lyons (1946-2008)
copyright 1974

Random House, Inc
Ballantine Books
ISBN 374 24974
March 1976

LUST, Be A Lady Tonight by Rod Gray

When the world's sexist spy tracks you down

It's a pleasure to be caught.

K & G Publications, Ltd

Blow Your Mind

Her name is Eve Drum, The Lady From L.U.S.T., the sexiest spy in the world. Anything anyone can do she can do better. They call her Oh Oh Sex, because sex is her favorite weapon, but she is just as good at Karate, safe cracking, knife throwing, scuba diving, you name it. Don't tangle with her. She has a license to kill and she does not care if she uses her body or a Beretta. Swing along as she goes into action against a super villain who wants to wreck N.A.T. O. and heat up the Cold War to flash point. It will blow your mind.

Belmont Books

Printing History

 Written by Gardner F. Fox
  

Original Title The Lady From L.U.S.T.
 

Tower Books

1st Printing 43-804 (1967)
 

Belmont Books

2nd Printing B95-2020 (June 1970)
 

Belmont Tower Books

3rd Printing BT 50516 (1973)

K & G Publications, Ltd.

Ben's Books Ltd

London England

1968

Secret Mission: Munich by Don Smith

Mission No 10

Millions of counterfeit dollars bankrolling resurgence of dangerous successful neo-Nazi gang. Sherman must find and destroy money factory, and the new Nazi leaders!

Greenbacks.....phoney. Millions of counterfeit U.S. dollars are circulating around Europe. Phil Sherman is ordered to find out where they're coming from and why.

Brownshirts.....genuine. An underground movement of Noe-Fascists headed by former S.S. officers is determined to pick up where Hitler left off. Unless Sherman can do something to stop them.

White slopes.......deadly. It's the world's best ski country, but for undercover agent Sherman and his beautiful ally, skiing across Communist frontiers is more than just sport. With phoney dollars in his pockets, a gang of fascist terrorists at his back, and the specter of a new Nazi Germany in the future.

Printing History

Written by Don Smith

Universal Publishing and Distributing Corporation

Universal-Award House Inc

Award Books

A727S (November 1970)

AQ1408 (February 1975)

The Kremlin Kill by Jack Canon

N3 tracks an assassin into the heart of the KGB!

George Gross Cover

Killmaster #193

A forty-year dream is coming true, and the Geneva talks on the unification of Germany are underway. But there's dissension within the party old guard and AXE suspects a plot by hard-liners to kill the Russian delegate before an agreement is signed. Nick's mission is to infiltrate the KGB, penetrate the highest circles of Soviet Power and prevent the murder of a country before it is born!

Printing History

Written by Jack Canon

Berkley Publishing Group

Charter Books

Published by arrangement with The Conde Nast Publications, Inc.

ISBN 441 45520

October 1984

The Loving And The Dead (3rd Edition) by Carter Brown

3rd Horwtiz Edition

Printing History

Horwitz Publications

International Edition Series #63 (1969)

Read more below
German Edition

US Editions

UK Edition


Trivia
This actually was not the first Mavis adventure. Mavis first appeared Honey, Here's Your Hearse from 1955.

Crime Fiction Alphabet: Letter J

The Crime Fiction Alphabet meme is rolling along and we are up to the Letter "J". Kerrie over at Mysteries in Paradise is keeping us all in line. My contribution for this week is the author:

James Hadley Chase (1906 to1985)

Mr Chase was born René Lodge Brabazon Raymond in London England on December 24th, 1906, he would move to France in 1956 and eventually resided in Switzerland. Chase died on February 6th 1985. He is one of the best known thriller writers of all time. 

The rise of the gangster culture during the Great Depression of the United States provided a big demand for gangster stories. Chase read James Cain’s The Postman Always Rings Twice and read about Ma Barker, using an American slang dictionary and maps of the U.S underworld, he then wrote his first No Orchids for Miss Blandish in his spare time.  All of his novels were so fast-paced that the reader was compelled to turn the pages in a nonstop effort to reach the end of the book. The final page often produced a totally unexpected plot twist variably Early books did contain some violence that matched the era in which they were written, though this was considerably toned down as plots centered more on circumstantial situations to create the high degree of tension that was the hallmark of his writing. Sex was never explicit and, though often hinted at, seldom happened. In several of his stories, the protagonist tries to get rich by committing a crime, either by insurance fraud or a theft. But the scheme invariably fails and leads to a murder in which the hero realizes that he never had a chance to keep out of trouble. Women are often beautiful, clever, and treacherous. They kill unhesitatingly if they have to cover a criminal act.  His plots typically centered around dysfunctional families, and the final denouement echoes the title. Chase's best market was France. In France more than thirty books were made into movies, and all of his ninety titles were published by Gallimard in their Série noire series. He was also very popular in other European markets, as well as Africa and Asia. However, his books failed to take hold in the American market partially due to the fact that the descriptive details did not seem convincing to American readers. This, together with their misogynist attitude, turned off the female market.

Various Covers

 

 

The Titles

Year published	Title	Central character(s)
1939	No Orchids for Miss Blandish also The Villain and the Virgin	Dave Fenner Slim Grisson
1941	The Dead Stay Dumb	Chet Sladen
1941	Twelve Chinks and a Woman also Twelve Chinamen and a Woman also The Doll's Bad News	Dave Fenner Glorie Leadler
1941	Miss Callaghan Comes to Grief	Jay Ellinger Raven
1942	Get a Load of This (short story collection)
1944	Miss Shumway Waves a Wand	Ross Millan Myra Shumway
1945	Eve	Clive Thurston Eve
1946	I'll Get You for This	Chester Cain
1947	Last Page (play)
1948	The Flesh of the Orchid	Carol Blandish The Sullivan Brothers
1949	You Never Know with Women	Floyd Jackson
1949	You're Lonely When You're Dead	Vic Malloy Paula Bensinger Jack Kerman
1950	Figure It Out for Yourself also The Marijuana Mob	Vic Malloy Paula Bensinger Jack Kerman
1950	Lay Her Among the Lillies	Vic Malloy Paula Bensinger Jack Kerman
1951	Strictly for Cash	Johnny Farrar
1952	The Fast Buck	Verne Baird Rico
1952	The Double Shuffle	Steve Harmas
1953	I'll Bury My Dead	Nick English
1953	This Way for a Shroud	Paul Conard Vito Ferrari
1954	Tiger By the Tail	Ken Holland
1954	Safer Dead	Chet Sladen
1955	You've Got It Coming	Harry Griffin
1956	There's Always a Price Tag	Steve Harmas, Glyn Nash
1957	The Guilty Are Afraid	Lew Brandon
1958	Not Safe to Be Free also The Case Of The Strangled Starlet	Jay Delaney
1959	Shock Treatment	Steve Harmas, Terry Regan
1959	The World in My Pocket	Morgan
1960	What's Better Than Money	Jefferson Halliday
1960	Come Easy - Go Easy	Chet Carson
1961	A Lotus for Miss Quon	Steve Jaffe
1961	Just Another Sucker	Harry Barber, John Renick
1962	I Would Rather Stay Poor	Dave Calvin
1962	A Coffin from Hong Kong	Nelson Ryan
1963	One Bright Summer Morning
1963	Tell It to the Birds	Steve Harmas, John Anson
1964	The Soft Centre	Frank Terrell Valiere Burnette
1965	This Is for Real	Mark Girland
1965	The Way the Cookie Crumbles	Frank Terrell
1966	You Have Yourself a Deal	Mark Girland
1966	Padillo's Play	McCorkle Padillo
1966	Cade	Val Cade
1967	Have This One on Me	Mark Girland
1967	Well Now - My Pretty	Frank Terrell
1968	An Ear to the Ground	Steve Harmas, Al Barney
1968	Believed Violent	Frank Terrell, Jay Delaney
1969	The Whiff of Money	Mark Girland
1969	The Vulture Is a Patient Bird	Max Kahlenberg
1970	Like a Hole in the Head	Jay Benson
1970	There's a Hippie on the Highway	Frank Terrell, Harry Mitchell
1971	Want to Stay Alive?	Poke Toholo
1971	An Ace Up My Sleeve	Helga Rolfe
1972	Just a Matter of Time	Chris Patterson Sheila Oldhill Miss Morely-Johnson
1972	You're Dead Without Money	Al Barney
1973	Have a Change of Scene	Larry Carr
1973	Knock, Knock! Who's There?	Johnny Bianda
1974	So What Happens To Me?	Jack Crane
1974	Goldfish Have No Hiding Place	Steve Manson
1975	Believe This - You'll Believe Anything	Clay Burden
1975	The Joker in the Pack	Helga Rolfe
1976	Do Me a Favour, Drop Dead	Keith Devery
1977	My Laugh Comes Last	Larry Lucas
1977	I Hold the Four Aces	Helga Rolfe
1978	Consider Yourself Dead	Mike Frost
1979	You Must Be Kidding	Ken Holland Paradise City Police Force
1979	A Can of Worms	Bart Anderson
1980	You Can Say That Again	Jerry Stevens
1980	Try This One for Size	Paradise City Police Force
1981	Hand Me a Fig Leaf	Dirk Wallace
1982	Have a Nice Night
1982	We'll Share a Double Funeral	Perry Weston Chet Logan
1983	Not My Thing	Ernie Kling
1984	Hit Them Where It Hurts	Dirk Wallace

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Thanks for visiting.

Dames, Dolls & Delinquents by Gary Lovisi

A Collectors' Guide To

Sexy Pulp Fiction Paperbacks

A Visual Smorgasbord Of Sex, Sin and Sass!

It's no secret the sexy and racy cover art of femme fatales from the golden age of paperbacks and magazines exalts the female form in all its sexy and sultry allure.  From sexy semi-dressed pin-up dolls to dangerous bad girls and deadly dames, many of these rear covers were painted by some of the most talented and collectible artists of the past 50 years, including popular American artists Robert Bonfils, Robert Maguire, Gene Bilbrew, and Bill Ward, and British Artists Reginald Heade and H.W. Pearl. 

Printing History

copyright 2009

by Gary Lovisi

Krause Publications

ISBN 978 0 89689 968

The Terminators by Donald Hamilton

To Be Safely Terminated by Extreme Prejudice

Mission #16

When the big man in Washington assigned Matt Helm to ride shotgun on an old buddy's top secret mission in Norway, Matt naturally wanted to know what was happening. "They need an agent with a lethal reputation,: said Mac. "That's all you need  to know." Matt hated theses "need to know" deals. But he went along with it until somebody murderer his partner. The girl who was supposed to be his "mistress." Now Matt was mad. Mad enough to blow operation "top secret" sky high.

Printing History

Written by Donald Hamilton (1916-2006)

Fawcett Gold Medal Books

ISBN 449 03214

April 1975