In a Vanishing Room

I took inventory, and 15 of the 17 novels written by Robert Colby between the years 1956 and 1972 are now available as ebooks for your Kindle. Based on the three Colby novels I’ve read thus far, I’m convinced that the author is an unsung hero of American crime fiction. As such, I was excited to read his lean 1961 novel, In a Vanishing Room, a book originally released as half of an Ace Double paperback.

The novel opens with an odd scene. While waiting to board a flight from Miami to New York, Paul Norris sees a fellow passenger in line abruptly run out of the airport and two other men in the airport pursue the runner on foot. Upon arriving in New York, a woman waiting at the gate (ah, remember when that was a thing?) is clearly waiting for the man who ran away before boarding. She says the man is her lawyer and appears perplexed that he didn’t make the flight.

Norris accepts a ride into Manhattan from the woman - her name is Eileen - and tells her about the odd circumstances surrounding her lawyer’s escape from the airport. Upon arrival into the city, she invited him up to her apartment for a drink, and it becomes a near-certainty that Norris is about to get laid - 1961 style.

Not so fast, Mr. Norris! It seems that Eileen has something else up her sleeve. The seduction routine is just a ploy to get her hands on a shipping receipt for a large crate slipped into Norris pocket before the lawyer took off running at the Miami airport. In any case, Eileen splits fast leaving Norris with the receipt and a case of epididymal hypertension (Google it). This set-up is all rather contrived and tortured but will be worth it if the mysterious crate propel Norris into an exciting and mysterious adventure, right?

Lots of people want the receipt, so they can get the contents of the crate. Some are willing to befriend Norris to get the crate. Some are willing to pay dearly for it. Some are willing to kill for it. Understandably, Norris (and the reader) is uncertain who to trust. As the story winds through additional twists and turns, he pairs up with an attractive female corporate secretary on his mission to recover the crate for a wealthy benefactor.

The second half of the book introduces a fascinating hired killer and a vexing architectural mystery - the titular Vanishing Room - making for the kind of floor-plan mystery often devised by author John Dickson Carr. Unfortunately, the solutions to the Vanishing Room Mystery and the What’s Inside the Crate Affair were both rather ho-hum.

In a Vanishing Room is a difficult book to recommend. There were definitely some cool parts, but none of them fit together nicely into a coherent or particularly enjoyable crime novel. I’m not giving up on Robert Colby because I’ve seen what he can do when he’s firing on all cylinders - check out The Captain Must Die. Unfortunately, this one just isn’t much good. Take a pass. 

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Dragon's Eye

Scott C.S. Stone was a veteran of the Korean and Vietnam wars before settling into life in Hawaii as a journalist working for Reuters and The New York Times. He wrote a lot of non-fiction books about Hawaii and Asian culture as well as a handful of novels leveraging his knowledge of the Far East. His most enduring book is The Dragon’s Eye from 1969, an espionage adventure that won the 1969 Edgar Award buoyed by some great Robert McGinnis cover art in the original paperback printing.

Michael Hawkins, our narrator, is a war correspondent in Vietnam who quits the life after a colleague is killed in action. He retreats to Honolulu to work on a book, get laid and learn to surf. Hawkins’ easy life is interrupted by a visit from an old friend - a former journalist who now appears to be working for the CIA. He recruits Hawkins to help a British-born journalist defect to the United States from China. The would-be defector is currently working for Communist China’s state-run news agency.

Hawkins’ bounces from Taiwan to Hong Kong to Thailand to Laos and much of the novel feels like a bit of a Fodor’s Guide to 1969 Asia. I found it interesting because the narrator is an excellent tour guide, but those seeking wall-to-wall espionage action may get bored. Hawkins (and the reader, by proxy) learns about the labyrinthine structure of Red China’s intelligence apparatus, and it’s a pretty fascinating academic lesson. The upshot for the plot is that the New China News Agency is not like the AP or Reuters but functions as an intel agency with every reporter functioning as a spy. As such, the defecting journalist is a big deal - the highest ranking non-Chinese in Red China’s government who wants to come over to America and spill his guts.

Along the way to facilitate the defection, there is torture and sex and murder and lies and romance and double-crosses and everything else you might expect from a competently-written international espionage paperback. Stone’s writing is pretty excellent, and the story moves at a nice clip. It’s denser than most disposable fiction from the 1960s, but the extra attention that the paperback demands is rewarded by a compelling story with interesting characters and exotic locales.

For a book coveted by paperback collectors for its iconic cover art, The Dragon’s Eye was a total pleasure to read. If you are thoroughly disinterested in the spread of communism in Southeast Asia during the late 1960s, you’ll probably be bored silly with much of the book, but I found the whole thing pretty riveting and learned a lot within the body of this exciting adventure story. Recommended.

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Paperback Warrior Podcast - Episode 41

Paperback Warrior Podcast Episode 41 features an in-depth discussion of Ross Macdonald, including a review of the first Lew Archer novel.  We also talk about Robert B. Parker’s Spenser series, Lawrence Block, Frederick Lorenz, Harry Whittington, and much, much more! Stream the show on any podcast app, paperbackwarrior.com, or download directly HERE.

Listen to "Episode 41: Ross Macdonald" on Spreaker.

Tough Cop

John Roeburt (1909-1972) graduated with a law degree from New York University and worked as a crime reporter for The Brooklyn Eagle newspaper before becoming a successful novelist in the 1940s and 1950s. In 1949, he published the first of two crime novels starring retiring NYPD detective Johnny Devereaux - the first of which was titled Tough Cop and remains in-print today thanks to Wildside Press.

Johnny Devereaux is a top-flight detective with the NYPD who, as the novel opens, is preparing to retire at the ripe old age of 41. He explains to his barber that he’s “tired of being a tough cop in a world of shills, con men, killers, and plain crooks.” Devereaux wants to spend his twilight years reading good books and seeing the world on permanent vacation. Devereaux is no dummy. Before retiring, he wrote a book called “Twenty Years a Cop” that he signs for his admirers when asked. The department even bought him a brand-new Buick convertible to thank Devereaux for his two decades of service to the city. I wasn’t aware that municipalities did that type of thing for civil servants, but that’s why this is a fiction book.

On his way home from his retirement party, a beautiful young woman unexpectedly jumps into his car and asks Devereaux to drive away fast. She claims she’s being pursued by someone and recounts the story of her vaguely-recalled upbringing in which daddy lavished her with unwanted - and inappropriate attention. Because of this and other factors, the girl - her name is Jennifer - doesn’t believe that her father is actually her father. Against his better judgement, Devereaux agrees to help her get to the truth of her own paternity.

Jennifer’s alleged father is a member of New York’s high society and rumored to be a homosexual. Remember this was 1949 before gay people had sitcoms and reality shows depicting their fabulous lives. While running down an initial lead, Devereaux stumbles upon a dead body catapulting this family tree inquiry into a murder investigation.

Devereaux’s authority in Tough Cop exists in a grey area. He’s no longer working as a police officer, but his separation paperwork from the department hasn’t been processed. Basically, he’s serving as an unpaid private eye for Jennifer with the authority - but minimal support - of the NYPD. He enlists the help of an actual private eye, and that character has all the book’s best lines. It’s never entirely clear why Devereaux is going to all this trouble for a girl he hardly knows. Once it became a murder mystery of sorts, wouldn’t it make sense to turn it over to a cop whose not in the process of transitioning off the job?

Overall, Tough Cop is a mostly competent, but very linear, 1940s-style mystery novel. As far as the title goes, Devereaux is not particularly tough compared to his crime fiction cohorts. It’s a pretty forgettable book, and I can think of no reason to seek out the 1955 sequel, The Hollow Man. 

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The Camp

The Camp is a 1977 men's action-adventure paperback that was published by Belmont Tower under the name of Jonathan Trask. It came to fruition as a story idea from author and Belmont Tower editor Peter McCurtin. According to a Glorious Trash article, McCurtin wrote the first 30ish pages and handed the project to author Len Levinson to finish. In that same article, Levinson stated he couldn't remember why the transition happened and that he recalled that McCurtin left the publisher around that time. Sadly, the book has never been reprinted and remains as an expensive used paperback on internet bookshelves.

The novel begins with muckraking reporter Phil Gordon arriving at a small cabin in a rural stretch of northwestern Maine. On a much needed vacation from ousting politicians, Gordon re-connects with an old Native American friend named Jimmy Jacks. Jacks explains to Gordon that his three adult sons have gone missing around a strange military installation known as Camp Butler. Jacks elaborates that piercing screams resonate from the facility, and the whole area is saturated in barbed wire, killer dogs and pain. Intense pain.

Gordon, always chasing a good story, partners with Jacks to break into the secluded installation. Once inside, they find that imprisoned hippies (you read it correctly) are being victimized by torturers. This point is explicitly rammed home when readers and Gordon discover hippies tied to stakes and used as bayonet practice. Far out. Eventually, Gordon and Jacks tangle with some troops and a pack of killer canines before escaping into a cave. After a few days, Jacks goes home, and Gordon returns to Washington.

Levinson's narrative propels readers into Washington D.C.'s political circus as Gordon discreetly blows the whistle on the U.S. Army’s hippie torture camp to Congress. After receiving the backing of a U.S. Senator, a unique proposition is arranged that allows Gordon, a former Green Beret Captain, to re-enlist in the Army with a colorful fruit salad and specific orders to report to Camp Butler. Once inside the camp, Gordon gains a first-hand, personal account of the military's strong-arm tactics, bizarre regiments and murderous atrocities. He also discovers that much of the U.S. Government is under the control by a secret cabal of ultra right-wingers.

It's clear that Levinson really enjoyed writing The Camp. It's wild, wacky and bizarre...but for all of the right reasons. It's an enjoyable book that incorporates the era's pop-culture movement of investigative reporters as the proverbial hero. Possibly Levinson - or McCurtin - were inspired by the 1976 film All the Presidents Men and the idea that a determined journalist can expose governmental corruption. Regardless, I perceive The Camp as being a pulpy nod to the men's adventure magazines (MAMs) that recreated vile, sadistic military bases for the heroes to liberate. It's that over-the-top thrill-ride that makes The Camp so much campy fun.

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Steve Bentley #01 - Murder on the Rocks

Everette Howard Hunt (1918-2007, better known as E. Howard Hunt) worked for the CIA as a covert officer specializing in political influence and action. Before devising his best-known plot, the infamous Watergate burglary that saw President Nixon impeached and himself imprisoned, Hunt authored nearly 40 crime-fiction and espionage novels using pseudonyms including David St. John, P.S. Donoghue, Gordon Davis, John Baxter and variations of his own name. As Robert Dietrich, Hunt wrote ten novels starring Steve Bentley, a Washington D.C. accountant who solves murders in private-eye style. The series debut, Murder on the Rocks, was originally published in 1957 and has now been reprinted as an affordable ebook by Cutting Edge.

The first thing to know about Bentley is that he isn't just a paper-pushing CPA. He's a Korean War veteran who was employed at one time by the U.S. Treasury Department. His expertise led to breaking up a number of black market rings globally. It's this reason that a client named Iris Seawall approaches Bentley in a bar. She wants Bentley to assist in locating a valuable emerald that was entrusted to her father.

Bentley's skepticism is fueled by a number of factors. For starters, Iris is married to a rough character linked to a gambling kingpin, and her father is an Ambassador in South Africa. Our hero's questions are valid – why not just use a private-eye? Iris responds that her father doesn't want anyone to know the failure he's brought to his position and feels that a private-eye may attract unwanted attention. Whether that's true or not isn't important, but it's a great way to propel an accountant into a lost treasure adventure.

Hunt uses Iris and her sister Sara as sexy bait for Bentley. Both are soon-to-be divorcees with bodies that were made for sin. However, Bentley mostly passes up the flesh buffet to seek out the treasure. When Iris's neighbor and her father's courier are both found murdered, Bentley's case becomes more complex.

Murder on the Rocks actually begins twice. First, Bentley declines Iris's proposal and the $500 that comes with finding the emerald. Second, Bentley also declines a $10,000 offer from Iris's sister Sara to find who murdered the courier. Third, Bentley declines an offer from a gambling kingpin named Vance Bodine. At one point, I was questioning whether Hunt was declining his own publisher's offer to craft a story. Eventually, the narrative is kick-started with a murder and the investigation is instigated. Murder on the Rocks features two sexy, desperate women, a stolen emerald and a determined hero. If you love vintage crime-fiction you should enjoy this tale.

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Swamp Sister

Robert Edmond Alter (1925-1966) sold dozens of short stories to crime-fiction digests including Manhunt and Mike Shayne Mystery Magazine in addition to authoring several children’s books. However, his long-form fiction for Fawcett Gold Medal consisted of only two novels, Swamp Sister and Carny Kill, both of which were published in the year of his death, 1966. America’s fascination with noir fiction involving sexy and unsophisticated women from the backwoods continues to fascinate me, so I decided to try my luck with Swamp Sister.

The paperback opens with a two-person plane - a Piper Cub - destined for Jacksonville, Florida crashing in the remote swampland due to an engine failure. The crash kills two men including a passenger carrying a briefcase filled with a $80,000 in cash.

Four-years later, “The Money Plane, ” as the locals call it, is a thing of legends among swamp people. 20 year-old Shad Hark has been searching the swamp for years looking for any sign of the downed aircraft with no luck. A New York insurance investigator tickled the town’s imagination after the crash with the news that there is wreckage somewhere out there containing $80,000 among the alligators and Spanish moss. Most locals have long since given up the hunt and some have died trying to find it on their own.

Persistence pays off for Shad one day when he finds the Money Plane deep in the watery woods protected by aggressive gators and cottonmouth snakes. He crawls into the tiny cabin, and recovers the briefcase. Because he’s a moron, he uses his Bowie knife to slice the briefcase to ribbons to get at the money. Because of this bad idea, Shad has $80,000 but no way to carry the cash back home. He decides to stash the majority of the cash in the jungle with the plane and fills his pockets with what he could carry.

The author makes the unfortunate literary choice to write the dialogue in the patois of dipshits from swamp county. This makes for a condescending and cumbersome read filled with sentences like, “Shaddy, you ain’t forgit you’n me is going gator-grabbing?” This crappy writing bogs down the plot considerably. To be honest, it’s a fairly lousy plot to begin with, but Alter’s tin ear for dialogue certainly doesn’t help.

Shad’s in love with a swamp girl named Margy with a heart of gold, and he takes her into his confidence about his plan to recover the stashed funds. Meanwhile, Shad’s spending of $10 bills recovered from the wreckage attracts the attention of a different group of shotgun-toting dipshits from town - as well as a trap set by the man from the insurance company who alerted the locals to the existence of the money plane four years earlier.

This book mostly sucks. Some of the jungle scenes with the characters dodging gators and cottonmouth snakes were somewhat exciting, but overall Swamp Sister should have been left to rot among the fetid, torpid waters of history. It’s been reprinted a couple times over the years, but new cover art failed to put a glossy sheen on this turd of a book. It’s still early, but this is the worst book I’ve read in 2020 thus far. To the Hall of Shame with thee!

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