I haven't posted in a good long while, but I'm not dead yet.
:) What I've been reading
-- I've been rereading a bunch of Edward Aarons Sam Durrell
"Assignments", hopefully for an article for Mystery*File one
of these days. For now, I'll say that while the Durrells
obviously have their peaks and valleys, in general I think
this is a very solid series, with the best installments
rather more sophisticated in their outlook and narrative
structure than you might think. A free one: one of the best
Durrells, I think, is ASSIGNMENT: SORRENTO SIREN.
-- A.A. Fair, FISH OR CUT BAIT. I've come slowly to the
conclusion that Erle Stanley Gardner is the great underrated
writer of American mystery fiction: I've never read any Perry
Mason which was less than readable, and the Fairs are
absolutely fantastic. Among other things, I suspect they're
rather more realistic than most PI books, with a kind of
grimy, gritty, sordid reality that you don't often find in
the genre (most of the Cool/Lam cases are set-ups of one sort
or another; there's the constant grubbing about for the next
check; etc.)
-- Max Allan Collins, TWO FOR THE ROAD. I've bought all the
Hardcase crime books, mainly because I think it's an
important imprint that deserves support. This reprint,
though, while an attractive item, is not that good of a read
(reprint of BAIT MONEY and BLOOD MONEY), very basic thieves
double-crossing other thieves schtik, very undistinguished.
I'm not a fan of Collins generally, though, you may want to
adjust your dial upward for that.
Not that I'm blaming HardCase for reprinting them, I
understand Collins's draw as a name.
-- I have lurked here on and off and am puzzled by all the
love shown Dominic Stansberry's THE CONFESSION, a rather
dull, programmatic noir that seems written to schematics: an
unappealing psychiatrist implicated in murders recounts his
"confession". Much is made, according to my notes, of the
illusion of personal identity, which is far too intellectual
a conceit to really ground and groove a narrative
behind.
-- Richard Aleas's LITTLE GIRL LOST is rather better, though
it's a very traditional Chandleresque novel that seems fresh
only in the sense that few are doing this sort of thing
nowadays. The novel is structured toward the ending, which I
did think was excellent.
-- Warren Murphy's DIGGER #1: SMOKED OUT is a book I'm glad
to have only because it's not that easy to find any more: the
story itself is sub-par Fletch stuff. Murphy was funnier with
the Destroyer.
I've been reading an awful lot of crime fiction, but little
straight forward hardboiled stuff: the bulk of it's been spy
fiction of one sort or another.
doug
Doug Bassett
dj_bassett@yahoo.com
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