During his life, Lou Cameron (1924-2010) was one of the most reliably solid authors in the men’s adventure, crime, war, and western genres. His 1977 police fiction paperback “Code Seven” has a cover blurb that promises the book to be “All the crunching excitement of Walking Tall” while the back cover guarantees “a nerve-sizzling suspense novel.” As a fan of Cameron’s writing, crunching excitement, and sizzling nerves, I was excited to dive into this one.
Sean Costello is the new chief of police in the fictional city of Flamingo Beach, Florida, a town of about three square miles. His new job is a chance at redemption for the chief who was recently fired from his police gig in New Jersey - ostensibly due to budget cuts. He’s an honest cop singularly dedicated to keeping his little town safe despite a lack of resources or much staff.
In police parlance, “Code Seven” is a meal break, which is an odd choice for a title. In the paperback, Cameron’s character claims it means “off duty” which, I suppose, is close enough for government work. The relevance of title has something to do with the romance that develops between Costello and a wealthy widow in his new hometown. This story-line seemed rushed and not entirely credible, but that wasn’t the centerpiece of the paperback, anyway. The point is that Costello is so busy putting out small fires that he’s never truly off duty.
For the majority of the book, Costello deals with the normal, everyday headaches, threats, and small mysteries of the job: drunks, a floater, a mouthy runaway, a suicide attempt, a stalker case, etc. The police procedural aspects of the novel seemed realistic enough to me, so either Cameron did some homework or he’s good at faking it. However, I kept hoping that the many disjointed plot threads would eventually form a linear story for the reader to enjoy or a mystery for Costello to solve.
Unfortunately, a main plot never really comes together. Some of the smaller mysteries presented as subplots are solved, and some tie into each other. However, it was an odd novel filled with nothing but subplots - almost as if Cameron wanted to write several different short stories about this interesting cop in a small, coastal town. The author apparently shuffled these stories into one disjointed book rather than selling them individually to the mystery digest magazines? Just a theory.
Cameron’s writing is predictably good, but an odd editorial decision left the book without chapter breaks. There are white-spaces representing scene changes throughout the paperback, but all 219 pages are basically one long chapter. As a reader, this was more irritating than I anticipated it would be.
Despite the myriad of problems with the book, it never failed to hold my attention since many of the subplots were rather interesting. I just wish Cameron’s editors sent him back to the typewriter for a few more rounds of drafts and forced him to develop a compelling main plot. “Code Seven” could have been a great cop novel instead of the mess he left behind.
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Between 1940 and 1964, talented pulp author Frank Gruber (1904-1969) wrote 18 novels starring down-on-his luck 'Johnny Fletcher'. Debuting in 1940, “The French Key” was a success that led to an eponymous film adaptation in 1946. Both NBC and ABC ran Johnny Fletcher mystery stories for the Golden Age of Radio. Beginning in 1964, Gruber signed a paperback deal with Belmont Tower for two more Johnny Fletcher books, “Swing Low, Swing Dead” and “The Corpse Moved Upstairs”. It appears that business arrangement led to a number of reprints of the Fletcher books for a new generation of fans. The misleading cover art paints Johnny Fletcher as a gun-toting detective instead of the bumbling, comical conman that Gruber intended.
My first experience with the series is the 1964 novel “Swing Low, Swing Dead”. While researching, I discovered that there are three fixtures with nearly every Fletcher novel. First, Fletcher's muscular sidekick Sam Cragg is featured in a bulk of the narrative and is just as important to the story as Fletcher. Two, the imprudent duo are always destitute, leading to charity from series character and hotel manager Mr. Peabody. For small favors, he allows them residence in New York's 45th Street Hotel. Lastly, the two always stumble into a mystery! That's really par for the course. Gruber takes some liberties and asks his readers to suspend their beliefs for the sake of a good story.
Discovering a craps game on the hotel's upper floor, both Fletcher and Cragg join the fun. In a fortunate streak of luck, Cragg bets borrowed money against a rock singer named Willie Waller. The musician, out of funds, bets a song manuscript against Cragg, promising it's worth hundreds of thousands. Quickly after losing the game and manuscript to Cragg, he dies from cyanide poisoning.
The bulk of the novel's 154-pages is Fletcher and Cragg determining the validity of the song and it's value. After cleared by the police of any suspicion, it's the duo's job to sell the song for the promised value. Once they stumble on a music producer and his client, a chart-topping musician named Al Donnely, they realize that either Willie's song was plagiarized or Willie ripped off the melody from Donnely. The answer Fletcher and Cragg are both seeking could be worth a small treasure due to the tune's rise to the top of the charts.
While all of this is fairly interesting from a music fan's standpoint, the idea of who killed Willie is the emphasis of this Fletcher mystery. With both Cragg and Fletcher seeking the true songwriter, they must contend with a shady record business and a scar-faced goon who might have his own motives for wanting the songwriter's identity. Again, despite Belmont's action-packed artwork...this is a lighthearted yarn - not the violent espionage or violent crime-noir story depicted on the cover.
Gruber's comedic approach connects Fletcher and Cragg to an Abbott and Costello sort of gag. The two are always counting pennies, shortchanging bartenders and begging Mr. Peabody for just one more buck. Their sole moneymaking endeavor is a snake-medicine bit with Cragg breaking chains and Fletcher selling a bogus book on how to gain super-strength in a few short weeks. “You can break chains too for a measly $2.90...no change back”. It's an entertaining short read that showcases Gruber's storytelling strength in the pulp fiction formula.
Through his characters, Gruber criticizes rock music as something that's immature and dumbed down for a new audience while praising the jazz era when music was...music. I think Gruber was probably comparing the mid-60s literary work of his new peers to the pulp fiction that paid the bills in his recent past. Regardless, Johnny Fletcher is elementary and a fun read if you keep your expectations minimal.
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In this episode, we discuss Frank Gruber's 1964 crime-mystery "Swing Low, Swing Dead" and Lou Cameron's police fiction novel "Code Seven" from 1977. Tom talks about his book shopping in San Antonio, Texas and offers listeners a tutorial on how to affordably acquire paperbacks. Stream it below or through any popular streaming service. Direct downloads: Link
Listen to "Episode 08: Buying Affordable Paperbacks" on Spreaker.
Not much is known about author Everard Meade. I learned he was born in 1917, and although I could find no obituary, the odds of his continued longevity aren’t promising. As far as I could tell, “Murder Squad” from 1978 was one of a handful of war and political thrillers he authored in that era. It was published by low-end paperback house Major Books of Canoga Park, California. I’m always hoping that I may have stumbled upon a lost classic of Men’s Adventure Literature, so I gave it a read.
Our narrator is unemployed Vietnam vet Mike Gordon who arrives at a secret farm quietly guarded by the U.S. Marines for a meeting with his former commanding officer. Gordon is offered a job as an independent operative for a top-secret government agency with an assignment of dismantling a Soviet operation in Italy counterfeiting U.S. currency. The Russian project has a goal of collapsing the American economy through injecting a tidal wave of funny money into global circulation. Destroying the counterfeiting operation in Italy is too thorny of an operation for the U.S. Treasury Department, so our leaders turn to the secret agency on the farm to handle the violent overseas mission.
After accepting the assignment, it’s time for Gordon to meet the team. We have a judo expert, a pistol marksman, a safecracker, an electronics expert, and a couple other guys whose skills just seem to be general badassery. Gordon is one of the fluent Italian speakers on the team, and he is trained on the manufacturing of U.S. currency by the Bureau of Printing and Engraving just in case the assignment needs an undercover man. The team is called “The Barbarians” after the warriors who vanquished Rome in the past.
As it becomes clear that The Barbarians intend to not only destroy the counterfeiting equipment but slaughter everyone involved in the engraving operation, Gordon begins to have some misgivings about the integrity of the mission. And that’s where “Murder Squad” diverges from other team-based action novels. Gordon is a man of ethics who comes to the realization that he’s joined up with a team of kill-crazy nutjobs, and he needs to figure out what to do next - a little like changing a tire on a moving car.
The author’s writing in “Murder Squad” was pretty good - nothing flashy, but serviceable. I also found the setup to be very compelling and the climax to be exciting. However, it lagged quite a bit in the middle when the Murder Squad was trying to infiltrate the counterfeiting operation in Italy. As such, the core of the paperback was fairly dull. Overall, the book was about as good as a mediocre Mack Bolan paperback - nothing special but not awful enough to hate. Should you read this one? Life is short. You can do better.
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Author Louis Malley (1922-1962) was raised in the Bronx, Harlem and the Little Italy neighborhoods of New York City. Malley authored four gritty crime novels that paralleled his own life. As a former gang member, the books are written with a sense of authenticity. This is clearly evident with the author's 1953 novel “Stool Pigeon,” which was reprinted in 1960 as “Shakedown Strip.” In July 2019, Stark House Press reprinted the novel as the 21st paperback under their Black Gat imprint.
The book's protagonist is Vincent Milazzo, a Detective First-Grade investigating the murder of criminal heavyweight, Tony Statella. As a native of Little Italy, everyone knows Milazzo and his family, an aspect that has both advantages and disadvantages in his line of work. As a police procedural, the author weaves portions of Milazzo's personal history into the narrative. Milazzo's father was a shop keeper and often tangled with the mob. His uncle ran a factory and may have had ties to the city's underworld. His ex-girlfriend Gina was often close company for one of the city's biggest criminals, Rocky Tosco. Milazzo carries some heavy baggage with the badge.
Milazzo's focus is interviewing Statella's colleagues and cohorts, ranging from the higher echelons like Tosco to the gutter pigeons that talk for a nickel. With his partner Whiteman, the duo begins piecing together a dark web of pornography, prostitution and money laundering that seemingly connects to Tosco. However, Tosco won't talk and Milazzo starts to feel the pressure from his Chief. When Statella's murder suspect is revealed, it has a close connection to Milazzo's past and creates a fun plot twist for the reader.
“Stool Pigeon” is a good crime-fiction novel. While it bears similarities to the greats – Ed McBain (Evan Hunter) and David Goodis, it never quite reaches that skill-level. I think it is a fair assessment considering few authors could achieve that remarkable storytelling. The personal conflicts in Milazzo's life – the shedding of his wholesome identity – is probably the richest vein to explore. The blending of the character's inner turmoil with the investigation and media frenzy was a well-calculated mix that I enjoyed. Overall, you can do much worse than Louis Malley.
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Esteemed author Max Allan Collins is a heavy contributor to the gritty, hard-boiled line of mystery fiction. His well-respected creations include Nate Heller, Nolan, Mallory and the subject at hand, Quarry. The Thrilling Detective blog cites Quarry as the first hired killer series, predating Loren Estleman’s Peter Macklin and Lawrence Block’s Keller. Collins released the debut, The Broker (aka Quarry), in 1976. After four more novels, and a ton of fan mail requests, the author began releasing series installments again in 2006. Contrary to The Broker as sequentially the first Quarry novel by publication date, it isn’t the chronological beginning. Quarry’s fictional accounts begin in this origin novel, The First Quarry (2008), and seemingly ends with The Last Quarry (2006). But aside from those bookends, the series can be read in any order.
Collins introduces our killer on a frosty December night in 1970. Quarry is a 5’-10”, 155-pound average build and a former U.S. Marine sniper. His experiencing killing Vietcong for low money has now extended domestically with a new business model and booming sales potential. In a brief recap, the reader learns that Quarry returned home after ‘Nam only to find his bride under a mechanic in the sack. In the blunt revenge tactic, Quarry catches the mechanic under a car…and ruthlessly kicks the jack out. The murder is widely publicized, but Quarry somehow gets off. This book’s opening pages has Quarry camped in a new suburban neighborhood in Iowa City performing surveillance. The homework is an effort to kill a college professor named K.J. Byron, ultimately Quarry’s first job offer in this new career opportunity.
An assassination service headed by the name The Broker offers Quarry the assignment to kill Byron after learning about his cold-blooded mechanic murder in the media. The Broker receives kill-jobs from needy clients which are then commissioned to hit men. In what would become a staple of the series, The Broker simply calls our narrator “Quarry” with no indication if it’s meant as a first or last name. Regardless, this unnamed trait is the formula for the genre, evident in Dashiell Hammet’s Continental Op and Bill Pronzini’s Nameless Detective. To size up Quarry’s expertise, the first assignment is killing this professor. The client’s daughter, Annette, has been collaborating with Byron on a book in exchange for working her young pupil hips and lips. While this is enough to maintain any fatherly vendetta, the larger piece is a manuscript outlining mafia action Annette has witnessed in the family business. Killing Byron and destroying the manuscript is imperative…but proves to be an arduous task for Quarry.
In true hard-boiled fashion, this first-person narrative has the protagonist displaying the sturdy antihero archetype. He’s completely void of morality, often breaking conventional ethics and driven by self-interest. While bravado fueled novels like Don Pendleton’s War Against the Mafia defines rigid boundaries and a sense of right and wrong, Collins leaves Quarry dissolute; youth gone wild in all its moral erosion. Quarry sleeps with the client’s daughter and the professor’s wife, endangering an already fragile working relationship. He sucker-shoots, lies, cheats and steals to overcome his lack of physical superiority (noted in one scene where he can’t fight two African-American mobsters). As the elementary assignment becomes further entangled in scorned love and rival gangs, Collins is quick to remind us the web isn’t a complex weave. His quick summaries of busy, violent chapters are stylishly funny - “The good news was the girl wasn’t dead. The bad news was everything else.” Quarry is wicked and never out of morbid one-liners for the reader. He’s likable, but deadly, repulsive, but delightful and the “good” bad guy we all want to win.
For the lack of a better term…Quarry simply kills.
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Frank Leonard was a former New York City Welfare Department worker turned author who was nominated for an Edgar Award in 1972 for his debut crime novel, “Box 100.” It’s not clear to me what happened to the guy, but I found some mass-market non-fiction books from the same era about male sexuality and psychiatric wards that might be the same writer. Nevertheless, the important thing to know is that “Box 100” is an interesting time capsule that captures the dysfunction of 1970s New York City in a mystery surrounding the welfare system and its inhabitants.
The narrator is Ross Franklin, a new investigator with a second-tier agency called the New York City Department of Investigation that functions as a local Inspector General’s office addressing waste, fraud, and abuse in city government. This being 1972, anonymous complaints regarding government services can be mailed to P.O. Box 100 in NYC, and it’s Ross’ job to open the mail and assess the legitimacy of the incoming complaints for their investigative value.
The cynicism of civil service workers is thick at the Box 100 department. Investigators spend their days mocking constituents and writing up fake investigative reports to create the illusion of productivity. It’s hilarious to read while also tragic to consider that such government agencies may have existed then and now.
Because Ross is the new guy at work, he decides to take his job seriously, and his first Box 100 investigation involves a simple complaint about a Brooklyn resident receiving and negotiating duplicate welfare checks in one month. Ross takes a deep dive into the NYC 1970s welfare system and the black ghettos it subsidized with the insider knowledge that only a former welfare department worker could muster. You can almost imagine the author sitting at his metal desk working his soul-crushing job thinking, “This is crazy. I should write a book about this.” You’ve probably thought that about your job too. The difference is that this guy actually wrote the book.
Ross pulls on the thread of what is essentially a check fraud case and unravels a conspiracy of corruption and double-dealing inside city government and beyond. Leonard was a good writer, but none of this really amounted to all that compelling of a story. It’s likely that the author hoped “Box 100” would launch a mystery series, but it never came to pass. The paperback just wasn’t interesting enough to generate much demand. If you find this at a thrift store for a quarter, it might be worth your time, but don’t sell your spare kidney to score a rare copy.
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