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RARA-AVIS: Query on two authors 

On Sun, 9 Feb 1997, "M. Taboada" <taboada@math.odu.edu> wrote: 


**************************************************
SPOILER ALERT: 
Skip this message if you want to miss a spoiler of 
Cleve F. Adams *Up Jumps the Devil*
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[SNIP]
>I also found several hardcovers, among which are the following:
>
>*Decoy, by Cleve Adams, Books Inc. 1944 (apparently a reprint of a
>1941 Dutton book). It features a detective called Rex McBride and, on
>first browsing, seems to be competently if not brilliantly written.
>
>*The man who paid his way, by Walt Shelton, Lippincott, 1955. A very
>casual browse indicates that this is a "spicy" novel, meaning that
>there is plenty of sexual innuendo.
>
>This is the first time I have encountered these authors, and I have never
>seen a reference to the. Are these pseudonyms or real names? Does anyone
in 
>this list have relevant information?

I looked in Haycraft's *Art of the Mystery Story* and drew a blank on
Shelton [Sheldon], ditto in Binyon's *Murder Will Out* and Symons's *Bloody
Murder* [aka *Mortal Consequences* in US].  There's no mention of either in
Symons, but I found quite a bit on Adams (1895-1949):

        'Cleve Adams, Cornell Woolrich (William Irish), Vera Casparay,
Dorothy B. Hughes 
        and half a dozen others have lately become Important because the
films have brought 
        them out from under their bushels'
        Richard Mealand, 'Hollywoodunit' in Haycraft [Mealand doesn't
elaborate on 'the films']

        '[...] Cleve F. Adams's *Up Jumps the Devil*. a stalwart white
Nordic novel which has only 
        contempt for what the author consistently terms kikes, wops, spigs
and niggers, and only 
        scorn for the war effort.  The prIvate detective here solves the
case by guessing at a suspect,
        kidnapping him, and having him tortured by a gangster until he
confesses.  Whe an FBI man
        objects to these Gestapo-like methods, the private eye ringingly
complains "An American Gestapo
        is what we goddammed well need!"'
        Anthony Boucher, 'The Ethics of the Mystery Novel' in Haycraft.

Haycraft notes in an introduction to James Sandoe's 'Readers' Guide to
Crime' that he thinks Adams's *Sabotage* (1940) ought to be included
(Sandoe doesn't include any Adams in his list).  Haycraft also mentions
Adams among a list of 'capable or better newcomers' in his essay, 'The
Whodunit in WWII and After.'

T. J. Binyon remarks, however, that Adams' character, Rex McBride, is part
of the 'mere list of names' as the genre declines. He also notes that
McBride appears in *Sabotage* and *Death Before Breakfast*, the latter has
the title *Death at the Dam* in the UK.

ED

********************************
Things They Might've Said
No. 2 In An Occasional Series

'I tried socialism once---but I didn't inhale'
Tony Blair, Leader of the 
(so-called) Labour Party
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