Is there anyone out there who does pure rage better than
Mickey Spillane? Forget the errant knight. Mike Hammer is all
about revenge. In I, THE JURY, Hammer piles up bodies to
avenge the death of a friend. In MY GUN IS QUICK, Hammer
stops at nothing to find the killer of a woman he met and
knew for about five minutes.
VENGEANCE IS MINE revisists the same basic plot as I, THE
JURY, but with some twists. It starts out with Hammer waking
up from a hangover to find the police standing over him and a
war buddy dead from an apparent suicide. Since the deceased
used Hammer's gun while Hammer was passed out, Hammer loses
his PI ticket. The DA couldn't be more pleased.
No problem. Girl Friday Velda has a PI ticket. So now Hammer
works for Velda, and his first case as a legman is to get his
PI ticket back. After some quick checking, both Hammer and
Homicide dick Pat Chambers realize that the killing wasn't a
suicide. The trail leads to a modeling agency that seems to
be more than that.
Spillane doesn't dodge the parallels to I, THE JURY. He faces
them head on, pointing out that Juno, the lady in charge of
the agency, looks very much like Charlotte from the first
novel.
VIM is as over the top as you'd expect the early Hammers to
be. But what sets this story apart from the previous two is
the impression that Hammer may not be the most reliable
narrator. You can see how the story might be told from Pat
Chambers' point of view or from Velda's, who holds her own in
this one, even clipping one of the bad guys near the end. We
know what's going on around Hammer. We also know he's a bit
full of himself.
Which works just fine here. This is clearly a fantasy. Hammer
breaks into people's houses and shoots people without a gun
permit (in a couple of cases with the victim's own
gun.)
Love him, hate him, Mike Hammer is a product of his times as
much as Marlowe or Spenser or Patrick Kenzie. The paranoia
and rage ooze throughout this story, especially in the latter
half, when Hammer decides he's been too soft up until
now.
Much is made of the body count in the early Hammers.
THRILLING DETECTIVE points out that, out of the 48 people who
die in the first five books, 34 die by Hammer's hand. In real
life, a PI would lose his ticket, or at least his weapons
permit, after two or three. Still, Hammer is damned
restrained in both MY GUN IS QUICK and VENGEANCE IS MINE.
Unless you count Anton Lipsek's car accident, brought on by
Hammer chasing him, Hammer really only kills three or four
people between the two books. That's not to say he's soft. He
tells Chambers point blank he's going to kill the man who
killed Chester Wheeler and get his ticket back. He does
both.
Wait'll you see who the... um... guy is.
Jim Winter
http://www.jamesrwinter.com
http://jamesrwinter.blogspot.com
winter-newsletter-subscribe@yahoogroups.com
------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor
--------------------~--> Make a clean sweep of pop-up ads.
Yahoo! Companion Toolbar. Now with Pop-Up Blocker. Get it for
free!
http://us.click.yahoo.com/L5YrjA/eSIIAA/yQLSAA/kqIolB/TM
--------------------------------------------------------------------~->
RARA-AVIS home page: http://www.miskatonic.org/rara-avis/
Yahoo! Groups Links
<*> To visit your group on the web, go to:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/rara-avis-l/
<*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email
to:
rara-avis-l-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com
<*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to:
http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : 01 Dec 2004 EST