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A (Black) Gat in the Hand: Paul Cain’s ‘Fast One’ (My intro)

A (Black) Gat in the Hand: Paul Cain’s ‘Fast One’ (My intro)

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“You’re the second guy I’ve met within hours who seems to think a gat in the hand means a world by the tail.” – Phillip Marlowe in Raymond Chandler’s The Big Sleep

(Gat — Prohibition Era term for a gun. Shortened version of Gatling Gun)

Last year, Steeger Books put out its first deluxe edition hardback, containing all of Paul Cain’s short stories, as well as his lone novel, Fast One. I wrote the intro for Fast One, which is on every list of the greatest hardboiled Pulp novel (it battles The Maltese Falcon for my top spot). That was my sixth intro for Steeger, and it’s this week’s column. Clearly, I recommend reading this slim, recklessly-paced Pulp masterpiece.

Paul Cain’s Fast One is a relentless roller coaster ride, which never lets the reader catch their breath before the next heart-stopping drop. The hero, Gerry Kells, plays a never-ending chess game, in which new pieces are constantly added to the board. He maneuvers a constantly shifting labyrinth of players, alliances, and plots, like a Machievellian chess master. He doesn’t just respond to developments: He consistently moves to turn matters to his advantage. He is a hard guy, but he has a heart – which prevents him from being ruthless. A little more ruthlessness would have served him well.

Kells continually responds to the situations (which are often backed by a gat) thrown at him, by turning up the heat. Police, a newspaper, other gangsters – he’ll use, or take on, anything in the mix. It’s a continual sense of “What’s gonna happen next?” as you turn the pages. And when Kells gets an upper hand, a new wrench gums up the works.

Power, politics, and money: Kells continues to navigate this trilogy of shark-infested waters, right up to the final scene. If Kells had been willing to put a bad guy out of the story – or at least put a bullet in a knee or two, he would have had an easier time, moving forward. He leaves players on the board. And they’re not allies. He’s a tough guy, but he’s more honorable than his enemies.

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What I’ve Been Listening To: July, 2024

What I’ve Been Listening To: July, 2024

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It’s a week off from A (Black) Gat in the Hand, as I am currently reading Pulp, but except for the constant revisiting of Norbert Davis’ Max Latin, I’m not listening to it (though The Continental Op is on tap).

I am constantly listening to audiobooks. I’m fortunate that my mind can multi-task, and I listen to them while driving, working, writing, when I go to sleep at night. It lets me get to things I wouldn’t have time to read. It’s often re-visiting something I read before. And I can fall asleep to something that isn’t new – no damage done. Here are some things I’ve listened to recently.

 

THE BLACK COMPANY – Glen Cook

A couple months ago, I scored a rare Q&A with the socially reclusive Glen Cook. It was mostly about his terrific Garrett, PI series, which I love. But it did touch on The Black Company. That series about a mercenary company is a foundation block for Dark Fantasy. I’ve read through the whole thing (except Port of Shadows, which I haven’t gotten around to yet) three times.

And over several months this year, I listened to the entire series on audiobook. As when I read it, I definitely like some books more than others. But it remains an epic, gripping saga. Again excluding 2018’s Port of Shadows, it’s ten books. I simply didn’t have time to re-read it (especially after re-reading most of the Garrett series for that Q&A). Listening to the books worked great. At least a book or two had a different narrator, based on gender needs. I liked the four narrators, with Marc Vietor reading the majority. That’s a key part of the audiobook experience. Definitely recommended.

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Little Madhouse on the Prairie: Wisconsin Death Trip

Little Madhouse on the Prairie: Wisconsin Death Trip

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Like many of you, I own a lot of books. Like perhaps not quite as many of you, I own a lot of very strange books, among them Aleister Crowley’s autobiography, a volume of Criswell’s predictions, a collection of “poems” by Victor Buono (he was King Tut to Adam West’s Batman; the title of his book is It Could Be Verse), a paranoid little volume called The Enemy Within that showed up one day on every driveway in my neighborhood in a rock-weighted plastic bag, and that blames literally everything bad that’s ever happened on the Jesuits (I’m probably the only person in town who actually read it — God, I hope I’m the only person in town who actually read it), the Exegesis of Philip K. Dick (the Lord talked to Phil, and boy, did they have some weird conversations), the collected works of Charles Fort, several volumes of the Shaver Mystery… it goes on and on.

There is no stranger book on my shelves, though, than Wisconsin Death Trip. Catchy title, huh?

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A (Black) Gat in the Hand: 7 Upcoming Attractions

A (Black) Gat in the Hand: 7 Upcoming Attractions

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“You’re the second guy I’ve met within hours who seems to think a gat in the hand means a world by the tail.” – Phillip Marlowe in Raymond Chandler’s The Big Sleep

(Gat — Prohibition Era term for a gun. Shortened version of Gatling Gun)

My life gets crazy busy in July, and stays busy to Christmas, when I get a break. It’s a task to get my planned weekly column done. Which can shift the ‘current one’ into ‘in progress’ status. Which is the case this week. So, here’s a look at some of the stuff I hope to cover in the current incarnation of A (Black) Gat in the Hand.

DAY KEENE

Last week I posted (finally) the Jo Gar essay which I started in 2018. Nice to check that off the list. The current ‘in progress’ essay is on a Day Keene story from the September, 1949 issue of New Detective. I’ve already written one post on Keene here. I think he is an under-appreciated hard boiled writer. That issue also has a story by Frederic Brown. And one by my all-time favorite writer, John D. MacDonald. So, maybe I’ll mine that one for more material. The fact you’re reading this post right now, means I still haven’t finished my Keene essay.

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The Scottish Play: Macbeth by William Shakespeare

The Scottish Play: Macbeth by William Shakespeare

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All hail, Macbeth! that shalt be king hereafter!

Macbeth, ACT I, SCENE III

Looking back on my second time around here at Black Gate, I saw that each for the first two summers I’d undertaken the enjoyable, if somewhat pointless task, of writing about a Shakespeare play (for what can I possibly bring to such an effort). First, there was A Midsummer Night’s Dream, then The Tempest. I skipped last summer because a sense of inadequacy for the task had me struggling to finish my piece about T.H. White’s The Once and Future King (pt. 1, pt. 2).

Having already missed last month’s installment of my column due to an ongoing run-in with a  5 mm kidney stone, I decided getting back to Shakespeare might be just the thing to get me moving. But what to read? I’ve only read fourteen of his thirty-nine plays, so I don’t know which of them have fantastical elements. And, then, it smacked me on the head, Macbeth. Not only is it my favorite of the plays I’ve read, but it’s suffused with magic, all black and malign. Then, there are all the movie versions, including a recent one starring Denzel Washington and France McDormand. So, let me begin. …

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A to Z Reviews: “Signs and Symbols,” by Vladimir Nabokov

A to Z Reviews: “Signs and Symbols,” by Vladimir Nabokov

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A to Z ReviewsVladimir Nabokov originally published “Signs and Symbols” in the New Yorker on May 15, 1948, although the editor, Katharine White, switched the order of the title to “Symbols and Signs.” Nabakov changed it back for subsequent publication, as well as reverting other changes White had made to the story. In 2020, Ann and Jeff Vandermeer included the story in their massive anthology The Big Book of Modern Fantasy.

A couple is trying to do their parental duty by visiting their son for his birthday. Despite loving their son, the fact that he suffers from referential mania and lives in an asylum makes them vaguely uncomfortable in visiting him as they are never quite sure what to expect, whether he’s having a good or bad day, and how well he will interact with the real world.

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A (Black) Gat in the Hand: Hardboiled Manila – Jo Gar

A (Black) Gat in the Hand: Hardboiled Manila – Jo Gar

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“You’re the second guy I’ve met within hours who seems to think a gat in the hand means a world by the tail.” – Phillip Marlowe in Raymond Chandler’s The Big Sleep

(Gat — Prohibition Era term for a gun. Shortened version of Gatling Gun)

Several hardboiled books were not actually novels at the start. They were multi-part serials in the Pulp magazines of the day. Perhaps the most famous of these is Dashiell Hammett’s The Maltese Falcon, which ran for five installments from September 1929 through January of 1930. Likewise, Ned Beaumont’s four-part adventure became The Glass Key. The same happened with The Continental Op. And it wasn’t just Hammett. Paul Cain’s The Fast One is arguably the finest hardboiled novel ever – and it was a serial.

Raoul Whitfield’s The Laughing Death enthralled readers for nine issues in a row. A five-issue story became Green Ice; and Ben Jardinn spent three issues working on a murder in Death in a Bowl. The author of several novels for juvenile boys, Whitfield actually wrote another hardboiled novella, except it wasn’t collected and issued separately, so it’s not regarded as a book. And this was the only serial featuring his wonderful island detective, Jo Gar.

WARNING – THERE BE SPOILERS AHEAD!
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A (Black) Gat in the Hand: John D. MacDonald’s ‘Ring Around the Redhead’

A (Black) Gat in the Hand: John D. MacDonald’s ‘Ring Around the Redhead’

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“You’re the second guy I’ve met within hours who seems to think a gat in the hand means a world by the tail.” – Phillip Marlowe in Raymond Chandler’s The Big Sleep

(Gat — Prohibition Era term for a gun. Shortened version of Gatling Gun)

I’m putting the finishing touches on my long-delayed Jo Gar essay. But I realized I’ve not talked about my all-time favorite author yet here in A (Black) Gat in the Hand. I have written about a half-dozen essays on John D. MacdDonald, and I included Bill Crider’s review of The Brass Cupcake.

But I haven’t included any of his stuff in my Pulp column. Though he achieved fame as a paperback writer, John MacD honed his skills as a prolific Pulpster. He was a regular in Doc Savage in 1946, before breaking into both Dime Detective, and Black Mask, the following year. He became a regular in the sci-fi Pulps, and even contributed to the Mystery Pulp successors, Manhunt, and the (short-lived) Justice. Black Mask’s famed editor, Joe ‘Cap’ Shaw was MacDonald’s agent for a time.

Back in 2016, I wrote a detailed piece on MacDonald for the 100th anniversary of his birth. Click on over if you want to learn some things about him. Back in 2018,I guested in Steve H Silver’s Birthday Reviews column, with a rare science fiction post by me. So, bringing that one over here into the Pulp column to get some JDM here. More to come (though not sci-fi).

Every so often, I prove that the Black Gate firewall needs some serious tightening up by jumping in and putting up a post where I don’t belong (many readers and fellow bloggers believe that would be the entirety of the Black Gate website…). So, if you’re reading this, the crack web monitoring team hasn’t seen it yet. Don’t tell Steven. He might gnaw through the restraining chain around his ankle and crawl over to my desk in the cellar…basement…journalist’s suite to thrash me.

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A (Black) Gat in the Hand: Dime Detective – August, 1941

A (Black) Gat in the Hand: Dime Detective – August, 1941

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“You’re the second guy I’ve met within hours who seems to think a gat in the hand means a world by the tail.” – Phillip Marlowe in Raymond Chandler’s The Big Sleep

(Gat — Prohibition Era term for a gun. Shortened version of Gatling Gun)

 

Black Mask’s major competition came in the form of Dime Detective Magazine, which touted itself as “twice as good – for half the price” (Black Mask cost 20 cents at the time; though the price would shortly drop to 15 cents, in part due to Dime Detective’s success at the cheaper cost).

Editor Kenneth White (the same mentioned above) was instructed to lure as many writers from Black Mask as he could, paying an extra penny a word as enticement. And with a going rate of one to two cents for pulp writers (Black Mask’s three cents a word was indicative of its standing and quality in the field), the four cent rate made a significant difference to writers. As the prolific Erle Stanley Gardner supposedly replied to observations that he always seemed to use his hero’s last bullet to knock off the story’s antagonist:

“At three cents a word, every time I say ‘Bang’ in the story I get three cents. If you think I’m going to finish the gun battle while my hero still has fifteen cents worth of unexploded ammunition in his gun, you’re nuts.”

Writers were forbidden from doing novel serializations (The Maltese Falcon was first a serial) and were also instructed to create their own characters, which could not appear elsewhere, for the magazine. The onslaught was successful, with many of the era’s most popular writers switching to Dime Detective. Carroll John Daly (who brought the iconic Race Williams with him), Erle Stanley Gardner, Frederick Nebel and Norbert Davis (whose humorous stories were frequently rejected by Shaw but who flourished at his new home) were among those lured to Dime Detective.

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It’s Gonna Be One Helluva War: A preview of Monsters in Hell, volume 24 in the Heroes in Hell™ series

It’s Gonna Be One Helluva War: A preview of Monsters in Hell, volume 24 in the Heroes in Hell™ series

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Kindle and Paperback editions published by Perseid Press.  Copyright ©2024, Janet Morris. Book design: Marie Pitrat & Christopher Morris. Cover design: Roy Mauritsen.

Monsters in Hell just released this May 2024 (Kindle and Paperback editions published by Perseid Press).

Hell is a real place. Anyone who has broken a commandment winds up there. That’s pretty much everybody. Satan is the boss. You’re okay until you’re not. But never fear, all your friends are here. As well as everyone you’ve ever heard of. You are not alone and the party is in full swing. However, keep in mind: our Hell is unlike any other.

Picking up where Liars in Hell leaves off, Monsters in Hell continues existing plot lines and relates new stories with characters from all epochs of human history, as they struggle against torment and even more common problems derived from their own unique situations. But wait… things are changing, even for the Devil and his subordinates, in ways that will cause exciting variations, if not outright Liberation. The times, they are a changing…  As on Earth, so in Hell. Sometimes it’s difficult to tell where one leaves off and others begin.

Life and Afterlife, Earth and Hell… all mirror images of each other.

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