Too Many Girls by Don Tracy

Too Many Girls by Don Tracy
Berkley G-182
Copyright 1934

I had a hell of a headache when I woke up.

So starts this brilliant piece of noir fiction about the exploits of an unprincipled Baltimore newspaper photographer. The actual title (hardcover) is Round Trip, which really sums up the road Eddie Magruder goes down. And maybe the point of the first sentence is to inform the reader that the journey of Eddie was one hell of a headache for him but it's a pleasure for us because this one is special.

I forgot all about everything. For a couple of minutes I was back before I'd met Edith and this girl was a good looking pushover and my hands were inside the neck of her dress and giving her the works.

The novel starts with Eddie being sent out on an assignment to snap some photos from the aftermath of a lynching done by Eastern Longshoremen. Here is where we get our introduction of Eddie -tough youth, on is own as a teen, learning the ways of women from the streets, and consuming plenty of booze. The novel then turns into a flashback as Eddie tells us about the events in his life during the last few years. There is the suicide of a female newspaper reporter that he had final contact with and he seems indifferent about. Eddie has the moral nature of a heel with just a snip of compassion. He is willing to earn a few extra bucks taking "dirty"photos for distributors or receiving special favors from women for taking high quality shots so they can get public notice. But that changes when he meets and marries Edith. Eddie finally finds felicity and worth in his life. But the road he is given to go down, isn't level. In a fistfight, Eddie kills Edith's abusive ex-husband and he has to stand trial for manslaughter. It becomes an emotional ordeal for both Edith and Eddie. But after the acquittal, all the despair ends and there is a return to a life of contentment. Of course, Fate stacks the cards against a guy like Eddie and in the end it really crashes down on him.

I thought to myself that if they sent me up, I still had a hell of a lot to be glad about. I was a bum when I met Edith and now I wasn't a bum. I was up for killing a guy but I'd done it the right way.

Block out the meaningless title the paperback publishers gave this one, Round Trip is a monolithic hardboiled novel. In Eddie Magruder's world, happiness only gets touched, never embraced. He doesn't self-destruct or have ambitions that lead him down a wanton alley, Eddie is stuck and will forever be because guys like him are always destined to be lured up and knocked down. It's just the way life is....

James M. Cain wasn't the only one reshaping raw and gritty noir tales in the 30s. Don Tracy was also right there, he just never got the notoriety that Cain did. A fine example is Round Trip, this tragic novel stands pretty tall with what others were bring to the table at that time. With the exception of Edith's Ex-husband, there are really no evil people in the novel. Most are disillusioned souls lumbering in depression-era Americana and working for a niche in life. With Eddie being swallowed up in all of it. This novel predates Horace McCoy's They Shoot Horses, Don't They? and Gresham's Nightmare Alley and Richard Hallas' You Play the Black and the Red Comes Up, and I'd put Round Trip right up there with them.

A memorable novel. I won't forget this one.
It's one of the best that I've read.

Murder Doll by Milton K. Ozaki

Murder Doll by Milton K. Ozaki
Berkley Diamond D2016
Copyright 1952

She fluttered mascaraed eyelashes and laid a hand on my arm. "Has anyone ever told you you're handsome?"
"Sure," I said, "my mother. What's your name, baby?"

Novels containing characters that deliver a hardboiled narrative have always been a favorite of mine. And Milton Ozaki's Chicago P.I. Carl Good definitely fits that bill. Good describes himself as having "features like a fistful of dough and carrying the beginning of a paunch." He then adds in his favor are height and broad shoulders. In WWII, Carl Good was a paratrooper who saw plenty of action and did his share of killing. He's an impetuous guy who likes Scotch and girls, and fancies himself as a rough, tough guy in a fight. He knows the town and has plenty of connections, which is a big benefit for a man in his line of work.

Right out of the gates, Carl Good is trying to locate the missing Orville Pederson. Hired by his wife, Pederson has been gone for a few weeks and left her without any spending cash. Good finds Pederson's plaything in a Chicago B-girl joint, but in a few minutes she is dead after taking a poisoned drink intended for Good. He learns that Pederson is connected to the Chicago mob and performs real estate deals for them. And through his many street contacts, Good finds out the the heat has been turn up and this is making things difficult for mob operations. It's causing friction in the ranks that is leaving an opportunity for a Philadelphia kingpin to elbow in. Pisano, the standing boss, offers Good $25,000 to find the identity of the person the Philadelphia boys have sent to orchestrate the takeover. All they know is that it is a woman and she's a looker. Carl Good isn't one to let a financial opportunity go to waste, he adds that job to his plate because this is "real money." Later he realizes that both cases are interconnected and as usual in these PI plots, Good is smack dab in the middle of both of them.

As I said, I'm a sucker for hardboiled narrative and Murder Doll has some of the best I've read in a while. Here are a few that I liked:

"She's just a hooker," I insisted flatly. "She hasn't got enough brains to file her toenails."

I went up the side of a pile of two-by-fours like a scared cat and flattened myself on the rough timber like juice on a platter.

She came to me and lifted herself onto my lap. One arm went around my neck and her mouth searched for mine. I felt like spitting after the kiss, but I didn't.

As for the storyline, the majority of the time you can tell what is going to happen. But there are a few surprises. One is when an enraged Good chokes a thug to death after failing to make the guy talk. Later Good finds out that the thug had his tongue cut out. This didn't seemed to bother the PI at all. There's also a remarkable scene when Good is being hunted down in a lumber yard. In his pocket he happens to have a grenade that he took off a bobby-trap that was setup for him. Removing the firing pin with his teeth and lobbing it at his pursuers makes a satisfying payback. A couple of things come off silly in the plot. One is having a woman organizing the takeover of the deep-rooted Chicago vice organization. The other is a wild scene at a Nudist park where Carl Good is strutting his stuff trying to get the lowdown on how the woman is luring men away from Pisano's organization. And if you can swallow these, you'll find a good crime mystery in your hands. Milton Ozaki has Carl Good operating in the streets of Chicago where the surroundings are dark and grimy. Good isn't your compassionate P.I. and he definitely isn't in the game to be morally upright. He does it for the money and it also is a good occupation for him to release an inborn fury onto the bad guys. I liked the guy and will dig out a few more of his paperbacks. Chicago's Carl Good is a hard-headed and conniving private detective, who should have gotten more literary recognition.

This Berkley paperback edition was actually published in 1959. Murder Doll first appeared in the 1952 Phantom Books paperback authored under the name Robert O. Saber, a pseudonym used by Milton Ozaki.

Havana Hit by Mike Barry

Havana Hit by Mike Barry
#5 The Lone Wolf
Berkley Medallion, Copyright 1974

Barry N. Malzberg used the pseudo Mike Barry, for the fourteen Lone Wolf paperback novels he authored. Malzberg always seemed to find work. He wrote volumes of SF short stories that were published in magazines and anthologies. In fact, some are in book collections containing only Melzberg stories and these are very good. I recall three, “The Many Worlds of Barry Melzberg,” “The Best of Barry Metzberg,” and “Malzberg at Large,” as having some amazing SF stories. He also has a good number of novels in his bibliography. Besides SF, Malzberg dabbled in mysteries, adult sleaze paperbacks, and novelizations. In 1973, he started writing the Lone Wolf adventure series, introducing ex-NYPD cop Martin Wulff. From the four page introduction in “Havana Hit,” Wulff quits the force after his girl was killed by a deliberate overdose, and he becomes a one man wrecking crew that uses unrestrained violence to destroy drug kingpins and anyone that gets in his way. Alone, he built up quite a reputation, and now has the drug dealing organizations and the cops after him. Mean and obsessed, each adventure takes him to a new location where he leaves a large body count and extreme mayhem.

"Have you ever seen a seven-year old junkie? Have you ever seen a little girl holding a doll and so strung out on junk that she didn't know her name? Have you ever seen the soft men who peddle the stuff, the soft men in their houses on the bay, far away from all this, laughing at it, shielding themselves from what they've done, taking the money, filling the vein..."

It seems this story continues from where the previous one (#4) ended. Martin Wulff is flying out of Las Vegas on route to NYC with a valise full of heroin worth over a million dollars. Somehow this heroin was removed from the NYPD evidence room and got into the hands of organized drug traffickers. And during his last escapade in Vegas, Wulff went on a killing spree and blew up a hotel casino to get it back. The plane is hijacked and forced to land in Cuba. Taken into custody by a Cuba official named Delgado, Wulff’s valise is seized and he is sent to be executed. Delgado plans to keep the uncut heroin, sell it, and leave Cuba to live it up. But Wulff escapes and sets out to get the valise back. With a little help from a wimpy American helicopter pilot, he kills Delgado along with scores of other people and destroys the headquarters building. But the valise of heroin isn’t there. Delgado turned it over to DiStasio, who is the head of Cuban Intelligence. DiStasio has the same plan as Delgado had, take the heroin and get out of Cuba. Wulff hightails it to DiStasio’s estate and eliminates him to get the valise back. Then the wimpy American helicopter pilot gets enough courage to hold a gun on Wulff and attempt to steal the heroin himself. Of course Wulff outsmarts him and the American pilot ends up with a bullet in the spine and then one in the head. Martin Wulff races to the airport, hijacks a helicopter and off he goes, 90 miles north to the USA.

This one was painful. About a third of the way through, I said “it has to get better.” Halfway through, I realized it wasn’t going to get better. And once I finished it, I said “Thank God its over.” As an action novel, this one is lacking. The few scenes that have the explosions and gunplay are weakly described and there is no thrilling effect. The dialogue between characters tries to be hard, but comes off as tinny. And there are these constant-preaching rants by the character, mostly around how illegal drugs are destroying civilization. The only reason these rants seem to be in the novel is to fill it up to reach 192 pages. You get the impression that the whole idea around the Lone Wolf series was to quickly spit these novels out, and cash in on the popular 70’s genre of these numbered paperbacks featuring a violent crime crusader.

I got as much enjoyment reading this, as I would have listening to a Yoko Ono record album. This is the only Lone Wolf paperback I own, and I’ll probably not seek another. But I will not give up on Barry Malzberg’s SF stories. There are some good ones out there.

As for the scantily-clad maiden on the cover, no such female character is in the story. I hate when they do that.

Purple Aces by Robert J. Hogan

Purple Aces by Robert J. Hogan
Copyright 1933
Berkley X1746, May 1970

“G-8 and His Battle Aces” was an aviation pulp hero and from 1933 to 1944, he was featured in his own magazine. There were over 100 adventures that the WWI ace carried out, and his German enemies threw everything at him, in the air and on land. To keep his identity a secret, America’s flying spy was given the code name G-8. Along with his two wingmen, Nippy Weston and Bull Martin, many of the stories dove into the realm of science fiction, with evil German scientists working on the Kaiser’s orders to develop wicked ways to gain an edge during the Great War. In 1970, Berkley started reprinting these pulp adventures in paperback and I remember grabbing them off the drugstore rack.

In “Purple Aces,” captured American pilots are being converted into zombie-like flying warriors for the enemy. Induced by a chemical, it starts with them receiving a purple “ace of spades” birthmark on their forehead and quickly spreads the hideous color over the entire face. In turn, a demonic force controls the minds of the “reborn” pilots and they are programmed to execute suicide missions against American fliers. G-8 and his men are sent to uncover the source of this menace. Being an all-American hero, G-8 wastes no time engaging in dogfights and slipping behind enemy lines to get answers. Solving the mystery, which takes him through the halls of an ancient castle, G-8 meets again the mad Herr Doktor Krueger (a frequent enemy in many G-8 adventures) and a mind controlling genius scientist called Zwantag. Their final diabolical plan is in motion, time is running out, and both evil men must be stopped.

This is pulp at its best. It’s a highly adventurous tale, but what makes it stand out is that it is also a complete horror story. Hogan was a master of creating a mysterious lurking atmosphere, that takes the reader into lead-filled skies, dark dungeon enemy hideouts, and rat infested swamps. In fact the scenes in the swamp are some of the best I’ve read in any pulp story. Enhanced by mesmerizing dialogue and amazing air battles, “Purple Aces” is an adventure novel that can appeal to all ages. (Though like most of these stories, geared to the male reader) Whenever I read these pulp stories of yesteryear, I envision the early readers in the 30s and how in awe they must have been to be the first to escape in the adventure and the terror each story took them on.

Robert J. Hogan was an exceptional pulp writer and I forgot how much I enjoyed his tales until I recently revisited them. His pulp stories are full of mystery, adventure and horror; and if Berkley didn’t reissue them, I would probably never had discovered Hogan’s work. I believe eight “G-8 and His Battle Aces” novels were published in 1970/71, and the first three have covers by Jim Steranko.

1. The Bat Staffel
2. Purple Aces
3. Ace of the White Death
4. Bombs from the Murder Wolves
5. Vultures of the White Death
6. Flight from the Grave
7. Fangs of the Sky Leopard
8. The Mark of the Vultures

They are like a time capsule, from an era that seems to be fading away...

The exploits of “G-8 and His Battle Aces” are still being reissued. You can find them at Adventure House, along with Robert J. Hogan's other pulps, "Mysterious Wu Fang" and "The Secret 6."

Edge of the Law by Richard Deming

Edge of the Law by Richard Deming
Berkley G450, Copyright 1960

Richard Deming had a long career that ran from the 40s to the 80s. He wrote many short stories, novels and film/television adaptations. Highly admired, he created characters such as Manville Moon, Matt Rudd and took over the Tim Corrigan series under pseud. Ellery Queen. In "Edge of the Law", Deming introduces us to Jud Sands-who likes to work for mobsters, but doesn’t want to be owned by them.

“They say you’re a bullhead. Loyal, obey orders, but only to a point. There’s some things you won’t do for money.”

Jud Sands is on the run from his old boss, who runs the Miami syndicate. He wants Sands dead and sends hit men out to eliminate him. Sands arrives in the city of Ridgeford, which is wide open and is run by a racketeer named Renzo Amatti. Before you know it Sands is working for Amatti, as a muscle man. His first job is to lean on a bar owner to play along. When Sands finds out that the bar owner is married to his old girlfriend, he tells Amatti where to stick the job. Later the bar owner is killed by a hand grenade and Sands is fingered as the murderer. He makes an escape from the courtroom during his grand jury indictment, and with the help of a beautiful redhead, he goes into hiding. Later he sets out to clear his name from the murder rap and to get the Miami hoods that are out to kill him. Of course, he succeeds on both.

A good story but flawed. Sands comes off a bit to high and mighty. He has an answer for everything and always comes out ahead over everyone else. Jud Sands makes a lot of assumptions throughout the story. These I am sure were used to move the story along, but in reality things wouldn’t work that way. One example is when the cops only stakeout the front of a house waiting for Sands. Sands tells us that he knows they wouldn’t stakeout the back. Why not! Or during his escape in the court room, he knows they wouldn't guard the window. There are too many of these assumptions throughout the novel. The two girls in the story (his ex-girlfriend and the redhead) have an interesting relationship with Sands and that does work well. But it was easy to figure out who committed the murder and once you knew that, there wasn’t much left to the story.

I was looking forward reading "Edge of the Law" because I have always admired Richard Deming’s work. I may have set my expectations too high on this one. It is still is a good read, I would call it average, but not the best that Deming has authored.

Besides the numerous novels Deming wrote, he did pen some excellent short stories that were featured in many magazines for men. One of his best was “Hit and Run,” that was in the Dec. 1954 issue of Manhunt. It featured PI Barney Calhoun and the femme fatal in this one kept her murdered husband in a bathtub filled with ice. It was exceptional and one of my favorite stories from Manhunt. Later, Deming lengthened the story and published a novel version with PI Barney Calhoun in 1960. (same title:“Hit and Run” Pocket Book 1271) I have never been able to locate a copy of this novel, but will keep hunting.

Slay-Ground by Richard Stark

Slay-Ground by Richard Stark
Berkley, Copyright 1971

The widely popular Parker books are the real deal. I have yet to find one that is not excellent and it's easy to see why this series has a worldwide following. Great writing, great character and well-written plots; this one has it all.

Parker of course is the anti-hero/thief created by Donald Westlake using the pseudo name of Richard Stark.

“Tommy was out of the building by now, and spreading the alarm. But that hardly mattered. It was a new ball game. Parker had a gun.”

Just finished "Slay-Ground" and though it is very good, when compared to others in the series it may be my least favorite. Starts off fast and violent like all the books; with Parker, Grofield and Lauffman pulling of an armored car robbery. There is a chase, they crash and Parker takes the cash and gets out fast. He ends up hiding out in an amusement park which is closed for the winter and that's were the rest of the story takes place. The local mob discovers he is hiding there and seals the place off, trapping him inside. The mob with the help of two corrupt cops, plan to kill Parker and take the loot. He is left to figure a way to outsmart them and escape with the cash.

The strength of the series is the Parker character and the violence he gets involved with in the novels. This one provides plenty of that. But being trapped in the amusement park for the whole novel, took him away from what I liked best about the character. Which is Parker interfacing with others, especially his crime partners. He seemed out of his element and that made the story a little awkward. The idea of being caged and alone was good, but not for the whole novel. Excellent in other ways though. Nice fast start and Parker figures some neat ways to eliminate his opponents one-by-one. He uses the tools on hand with the results always violent. Also, fairly good ending involving his escape. It is still a very enjoyable Parker novel as all of them are, but I found this one a bit off track when compared to the other Parker books.

But still one of the best crime series ever authored.

For more on the man see the website: www.violentworldofparker.com

Renegade Cop by Jonathan Craig

Renegade Cop by Jonathan Craig.
Berkley D2015, copyright 1954
(Original Title: "Alley Girl")

Jonathan Craig is best known for the Pete Selby-Stan Rayder detective series, published in the 50s by Gold Medal. Though most books from the series are good, Craig's best work came from two other novels. One being Gold Medal's " Come Night, Come Evil"-with an awesome cover, and the other is "Renegade Cop."

Detective-Lieutenant Steve Lambert is a tough cop. He also is a mean SOB. Right from the start, we find him waking up hungover and slapping around his girl. Lambert and his partner are investigating a murder and the prime suspect has been arrested, a young guy named Tommy Nolan. They go to Nolan's house to interview his nice, loyal, loving wife. Lambert goes in talking tough to Mrs. Nolan and is immediately attracted to the "natural feminine aroma of her young body." He tells Mrs. Nolan that, he can work it out to help her husband if she provides him with certain "private services." The chapter ends with her going to the bedroom saying "Let's get it over with."

As you can tell, not a nice guy. Lambert is offered five thousand dollars to forget about a girl seen running away from the murder scene. Instead of solving the murder, he sets out to frame Nolan for it. Lambert continues to lead Mrs. Nolan on, and keep the "private services" coming. He even taunts Tommy Nolan about what his wife is doing, saying "when her husband's in a cell, he isn't a heck of a lot of good to her." As Lambert gets deeper and deeper into the corruption, events get more intense. Others start to figure out what is going on, and- as for the fate of Steve Lambert.......

It's a fine hardboiled story and pretty raw for 1954. As a reader, I wanted to tear apart Steve Lambert. Craig was good at getting to the readers emotions. Psychological interaction between characters, descriptive character thoughts, slick dialog and a damn good plot. Craig doesn't hold back on this one.

As for the original title "Alley Girl," that refers to the girl seen running away from the scene of the murder. Which develops into an unusual, perverted twist at the end.