Reviews – Page 3 – Larque Press | The Digest Enthusiast

Reviews March 5, 2023

Dr. Gatskill’s Blue Shoes by Paul Conant

Soon to be reprinted as Black Gat Book No. 44 by Stark House Press.

Paul Eugene Conant (1906–1968) wrote only three novels. This was the lone entry under his real name, the other two were as by Gene Paul. Gatskill’s presents a swell premise: Lieutenant Peter Hanley finds himself at the Whitman-Bourne Clinic, unable to remember how beautiful Narcissa Maidstone was killed. Did he do it, as several of the higher-ups in the force believe, or is he innocent as his boss, Inspector Battle, presumes?

Dr. Gatskill, her boss, Dr. Holmka, and a few nurses are tasked with prompting Hanley’s memory for the truth. Hanley was at the murder scene, he either did it himself or witnessed who did. Gatskill administer’s successively larger doses of sodium amytal that leave Hanley sedate and dreamy. Sometimes he’s talking to the docs, sometimes he thinks he’s talking aloud, but it’s all internal narrative. Conant handles the transitions in and out of Hanley’s dazed consciousness with aplomb. The Lieutenant’s memories creep slowly back from his subconscious mind as he relives snippets of the past; the big mystery and the reader’s need to know driving the story forward. The struggle inches ahead over the first 100 pages or so. Some of it is a bit repetitive, but Conant does a good job of keeping things as fresh as possible. As Hanley’s memories return, the pace quickens, the twists turn, and the final chapters bring a satisfying wind-up to an unusual mystery story.

Reviews January 28, 2023

Object of Lust by Charles Runyon

Object of Lust by Charles Runyon (alias Mark West)
Black Gat No. 43

Bombshell, Marian Morgan is bored with her husband, Dewitt Morgan, who works too much and pays her too little attention. She copes with liquor until the day she nearly dies. The close-call that rocks her world, and has her looking at her rescuer, Lewis Leland, in more than gratitude. That is, until his inner psychopath starts showing.

It’s a character-driven story, and the characters are all driven by sex. Thinking about it, engaging in it, and then reflecting on it. That gets pretty tedious in other sex books I’ve read, but Runyon does an admirable job of giving his original publisher exactly what they ordered along with highly readable prose, tucked inside a terrific crime story.

If I had to shelve this novel in a bookstore, I’d reluctantly forego the crime section and place in firmly in erotica. It’s 75% sex and 25% crime. The final chapters are particularly gripping as all that bedsheet steam finally gives way to different kinds of excitement and tension.

The final pages include a Runyon bibliography and a short bio. Black Gat No. 43 will be widely available February 20, 2023.

Reviews January 22, 2023

Room Service by Alan Williams

Staccato Crime SC-007

Successful businessman Miles Farrington is a moderately likable fugitive on the lam after he murders a young woman he picked up during an insensible drinking binge. A psychologist would suggest he imagined strangling his blatantly adulterous wife after the unusually cruel incident (even for her), that triggered the binge. After that setup, much of the novel explores milquetoast Farrington’s track as he eludes justice and hooks up with a short succession of hard-drinking harlots.

Room Service delivers a solid plot, but its hypnotic pull is its enthralling characterization, painted with smoldering prose and scintillating dialogue. You can put it down between readings if you want, but it won’t be easy.

Peripheral elements of Williams’ own life experiences abound in Room Service as its pages fly by. They’re illuminated through Bill Pronzini’s excellent backgrounder on this talented lost author, and this story in particular. If your hunger for classic crime novels needs sating, the Room Service revival begins in February 2023.

Reviews January 15, 2023

Awake and Die by Robert Ames

Black Gat Books No. 42

Will Peters fought in the Korean War and took home some shrapnel in his head. The docs told him it’s nothing to worry about, they just want him to check in every so often to ensure everything’s jake. Peters is our narrator, so we take his cavalier attitude at face value and move on. We dive into his simple life as a clam digger and fisherman, doing odds jobs here and there to supplement his income. He never drinks because the doctors told him not to. But he takes up with the wife of a low-life and she drinks enough for both of them. Peters puts up with her for her other charms. But as the months roll by Mae gets the idea they’ve been together long enough that in the eyes of the law they’re as good as man and wife.

Right about then, Peters catches a glimpse Claire Grace and he’s smitten like never before in his life. Now he wants Mae gone, and now ain’t soon enough. He also meets one of Mae’s cronies, Chris, a younger, prettier version of Mae. By the time the first killing enters his brain, we start to wonder about that shrapnel and the nil effects our narrator claims. Too late. The noir spiral is fully loaded and beginning to fray.

Awake and Die is a top-drawer crime novel filled with complex characters, unexpected incidents, and reeling emotions. And let’s not forget, Masek, Peters’ reclusive neighbor who only talks through his cat, his dog, and a well-fed seagull that seems happy to stick around most times. Or Rogers, the flawed, but relentless cop with a chip on his shoulder and spit in his eye.

Charles Lee Clifford (1890–1991)was a career Army Officer who served in WWII. He wrote as Robert Ames for Gold Medal and under his given name as author of four other novels. This Black Gat Books edition from Stark House Press includes his bibliography and a short biography.

Reviews December 18, 2022

The Best of Manhunt 4: Jack Ritchie

A fourth edition of The Best of Manhunt arrived as a complete surprise. Instead of the variety of the previous three, this one features only short stories by Jack Ritchie; mostly from Manhunt, with the added bonus of five more from ancillary titles. As laid out in editor Jeff Vorzimmer’s introduction, Ritchie was a consummate short story scribe. His openings grab, his prose sizzles, his characters jump off the page into your mind, and his stories transport you into a world of gamblers, crooks, killers, fatales, wiseguys, and all seven sins.

So authentic, Ritchie’s stories could be dramatized versions of true crimes. The prose is terse, at times brutal; the voice is street savvy, hard-hearted, and true to his downtrodden cast of deeply flawed misfits. Whether you’re a reader or writer of crime fiction, this volume is exemplary.

Reviews November 10, 2022

The Deadly Pay-Off by William H. Duhart

Bill Kelly’s introduction reveals that William H. Duhart wrote only two novels and a handful of short stories during his brief, impressive career as a crime fiction writer. This is a reprint of the first, originally published as Gold Medal 805 in 1958.

Although Duhart was Black, his protagonist, Tank Tabor, is White; it’s likely he had to be to sell the novel back in the late 1950s. Nevertheless, he include a sidekick of sorts, Jock Adams, a former black inmate, who Tabor met in stir. Jock is savvy, honest, and somewhat of an unsung hero without whose help Tabor probably wouldn’t have had as much success as he finally manages to squeeze out of the constricting circumstances he funnels himself into.

Tabor works for kingpin Arky Calahan who runs just about every criminal enterprise in Milwaukee. Calahan gives Tabor a few hours to dissuade his PI brother, Bill Tabor, to drop his investigation into the murder of a reporter who purportedly has damning evidence against Calahan. If Tank doesn’t get the job done quick, Bill is headed for the morgue.

Duhart weaves an intricate tale of tension, high-stakes gambles, and pounding action. His writing is crisp, delivered in a luscious, hardboiled rhythm that defines the time and place of the setting. Black Gat 41 is a prime opportunity to (re)discover a lost writer and a lost original crime classic. A perfect pay-off of the BG series charter.

Available for pre-order now. Due out in December 2022.

Reviews September 30, 2022

The Girl in 304 by Harold R. Daniels

This is the second novel by Harold R. Daniels, after his Edgar-nominated first novel, In His Blood (1955). The Black Gat reprint includes an introduction by George Kelley, slightly updated from its original appearance in The Mystery Fancier (Jul/Aug 1979). Kelley presents a succinct synopsis of each of Daniels’ crime books along with commentary on the writer’s growth.

The novel follows Georgia Sheriff Ed Masters’ investigation into the death of a Jane Doe discovered nearly naked in a remote area. The striking girl of the cover never appears alive in the story. Daniels delivers an engaging murder mystery, with tight plotting, believable characters, and solid writing. If there is any fault in the novel, it’s Daniels’ fastidious attention to detail. It’s all well done, but he could’ve left out some of the procedure and allowed the story to move at a slightly faster pace. Fortunately, the book overcomes this minor flaw with its numerous strengths and I hope Stark House/Black Gat will see fit to revisit the author’s other novels.

Sheriff Masters is the senior lawman you expect him to be—experienced, smart, and savvy, but what sets him apart from the pack is his ability to see the person he’s with. He adjusts his interviews/interactions based on the person he’s questioning. This nuance gives the character real depth.

Fans of classic crime fiction and paperback collectors will not want to miss Black Gat 40: The Girl in 304. Available for pre-order now.

Reviews April 1, 2022

A Sherlock Holmes Notebook

Stark House Press will release Gary Lovisi’s A Sherlock Holmes Notebook: A Cornucopia of Sherlockania in May 2022. This nearly 200 page trade paperback is packed full of essays, trivia, and collective treasures sure to please and enlighten fans and followers of the great detective’s adventures. Like many, I was introduced to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s Holmes and Watson while still in school. I read many of Doyle’s stories and watched quite a few of the movies and TV series produced over the years, but I had no idea of the extent to which the creation inspired first pastiches, and later new adventures, once the Canon fell into the public domain.

Lovisi shares the fruits of his lifelong pursuit of all kinds of Sherlockania with readers. Whether you’re a die-hard fanatic or a casual fan, there is plenty to delight in here through his series of over 20 articles and reviews, complemented with dozens of cover images of collectable first editions, paperbacks, translated volumes, card sets, plays, films, and even Doyle’s correspondence with Robert Louis Stevenson. Although Holmes is the center of all the attention, Lovisi does include a bit on Doyle’s other fan favorite, Professor Challenger, of The Lost World, The Poison Belt, and The Land of Mist.

A Sherlock Holmes Notebook by Gary Lovisi is a joy to read from first page to last. Whether you’re a serious collector of Sherlockania or a casual fan, you’ll find numerous leads to pursue in secondary markets out of curiosity or to satisfy a newly-stoked fervor.

Reviews December 11, 2018

Black Cat Mystery Magazine No. 1

An excerpt from my review of BCMM No. 1 from The Digest Enthusiast No. 7:

Editors John Gregory Betancourt and Carla Coupe welcome their readers to the first edition of BCMM from their “The Cat’s Perch” introduction. “We won’t shy away from intense, dark fiction that makes the hair on the back of your neck stand on end. Just as we won’t turn down the next amateur detective in the finest Agatha Christie tradition. Storytelling matters most.”

Black Cat Mystery Magazine’s debut includes an impressive list of contributors, many that will be familiar to readers of those bimonthly digests from Penny Publications.

Reviews December 9, 2018

Telzey Amberdon

Excerpt from Joe Wehrle, Jr.’s article on “The Telzey Amberdon Stories of James H. Schmitz” in The Digest Enthusiast No. 7:

James H. Schmitz wrote a number of stories about a future world where many things are possible, and particularly, over a period of ten years wrote a series concerning one Telzey Amberdon, an emerging telepath, “fifteen years old, genius level, brown as a berry and not at all bad looking in her sunbriefs.”

Jim Schmitz was born October 15, 1911, and lived until April 18, 1981. You may not be too familiar with his work as he wasn’t as prolific as many of his contemporaries, but he wrote dozens of exceptional stories and a handful of memorable novels.