A Devil for O'Shaugnessy/ The Three-way Split by Gil Brewer

by Gil Brewer

A DEVIL FOR O'SHAUGNESSY Tolbert O'Shaughnessy has been working the short con for years. He's not very good at it he's a grifter with a conscience, a terrible combination. Just the thought of bilking old ladies out of their life savings sends him to the brandy bottle to ease his pain. But Miriam has a con that's worth too much money to ignore. Her cousin, Joseph Lancaster, has been away for years, and she has found out that he died in England. Their rich grandmother doted on Joseph, but doesn't know about his death. All Tolbert has to do is convince Grandma that he's Joseph returned, quietly smother her in her sleep, and the inheritance will be theirs. A fine plan if Tolbert can keep his conscience from getting in the way! THE THREE-WAY SPLIT Jack Holland needs a break. His girl Sally is pressuring him to get a real job. His freeloading old man, Sam, is coming to visit--indefinitely. He needs dough. While taking some obnoxious tourists out in his boat one afternoon, he has to dive overboard to retrieve a tossed necklace, and discovers an old sunken ship instead. Could there be treasure inside? This could be the chance he's been looking for. But then some killers come to town looking to settle a debt with Sam, and things get complicated. And soon it's a race against time to see who gets the treasure first.

Genres: Noir, Crime, Pulp

Paperback

First published January 15, 2008

About the author

Florida writer Gil Brewer was the author of dozens of wonderfully sleazy sex/crime adventure novels of the 1950's and 60's, including Backwoods Teaser and Nude on Thin Ice; some of them starring private eye Lee Baron (Wild) or the brothers Sam and Tate Morgan (The Bitch) . Gil Brewer, who had not previously published any novels, began to write for Gold Medal Paperbacks in 1950-51. Brewer wrote some 30 novels between 1951 and the late 60s – very often involving an ordinary man who becomes involved with, and is often corrupted and destroyed by, an evil or designing woman. His style is simple and direct, with sharp dialogue, often achieving considerable intensity.

Brewer was one of the many writers who ghost wrote under the Ellery Queen byline as well. Brewer also was known as Eric Fitzgerald, Bailey Morgan, and Elaine Evans.

http://www.gilbrewer.com/

Reviews

[Dave · Rating 4 out of 5]

Two From the Brewmaster

A Devil For O’Shaugnessy is Brewer’s lost unpublished novel unearthed for the first time. It has a feel and pace unlike anything else Brewer published. Although like other Brewer novels, it is set on the edge of Florida’s steamy swamps, it is an odd story set in a crumbling mansion by the Gulf where an old grandmother kept on living in spite of all who sought to be bequeathed an inheritance. Of course, a crazy monkey who apparently is the reincarnated spirit of grandma’s ex-husband is the most exciting presence in the house. There is also the homicidal granddaughter and the hot-to-trot personal secretary. Into this maelstrom, Brewer threw a hapless conman who had no iron in his veins. That’s O’Shaugnessy, you know. When he’s not dancing with mad femme fatale granddaughter Miriam, he’s impersonating the long lost grandson, Joseph, who grandma dotes over, so he can get close to grandma. In some ways, a comedic set-up with Miriam impatiently crowing at her soft conman to finish the job and he hesitating and uncomfortable with the arrangements. While this story lacks the unending passion Brewer usually filled his tales with, you can still feel O’Shaugnessy sinking into the trap and realizing he’s now locked into the plot with no escape.

Three-Way Split is the other full-length novel in this volume, separated from conman and monkey thriller by a couple of shorts. Three-Way Split, originally published in 1960, is a more traditional nautical noir thriller of the type Charles Williams was known for. It features a down on his luck guy with a small boat who can’t meet the rent for his boat slip and a spotting of a buried Spanish galleon out there. Of course, it wouldn’t be much of a conflict if our hero didn’t have a bad news guy for a father, mean, ornery, and selfish, and on the run from a pack of mobsters for something he didn’t quite do a few states over. The interplay between Jack Holland and his old man is terrific. Sparks fly whenever they’re in the same room and Jack will never trust that old guy who won’t just take off and leave Jack alone.

[Jayakrishnan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Gil Brewer has great imagination. He writes good stories with outrageous plots and interesting characters. But the stories are a bit thin on detail. He has not worked hard enough on them. He has failed in realizing their true potential.

This collection contains two novellas and three short stories.

A Devil for O'Shaugnessy: This one had a great story. A brandy guzzling, tums swallowing con artist is persuaded by a femme fatale to pretend to be her long lost cousin so that they could swindle her grandmother of her wealth. A chimpanzee with extrasensory perception (I thought this was an ingenious idea!), the grandmother's secretary who seduces the con artist, the dead body of a nosy panty stealing servant and two private investigators stand between the two conspirators and the wealth. I loved the plot. I would love to make a film based on this story! But the writing is not what I expected it to be. The tortured first person voice of the con artist gets irritating after a while. This was a story with a lot of potential for humor. I would like to appreciate Brewer's audacity in willing to make a fool of himself.

Dig that Crazy Corpse: A parody of Raymond Chandler. Too many characters and irritating twists. I skimmed through it.

Love ..... And Luck: Normally, it is the tortured male ex con who is trying to start a new square life, only to be thwarted by a sleazy figure from the past. Here it is a female who is paid a visit by a figure from her past while she lives happily with her writer husband. This story had a great twist at the end. Brewer really had some wonderful ideas for crime fiction stories. Once again, I would love to make a movie based on this short story.

Indiscretion: Gil Brewer goes Luis Bunuel on us. A bored housewife goes out with not one but two men.

Three-Way Split: This one was unexpected. A nautical action thriller. The story is one which Charles Williams or Thomas Mcguane would have loved to adapt. I liked it a lot. Jack Holland, a tortured sailor with a boat discovers a shipwreck at the bottom of the sea when he jumps in to the water to retrieve the diamond ring of squabbling tourists. He teams up with an ageing sailor friend, Mike to dive for treasure. But his beautiful girlfriend Sally is trying to make him join the square life. His sleazy ruffianly father turns up and wants in on the treasure hunt. There are strange men who are looking for his father. I liked the descriptions of the ship's wreckage underwater. Three-Way Split is a pretty good story. Brewer has a great imagination. I will read more of his work.

Unlike The Vengeful Virgin, most of these stories have happy endings.

[Josh · Rating 4 out of 5]

A DEVIL FOR O'SHAUGNESSY

An okay pulp which lacks any real punch to the plot.

The reader is dropped knee deep in a con, with Tolbert O'Shaugnessy lured into a desperate game of deception by the lovely Miriam who has murder and money on her mind. With her elderly Grandmother still going strong and steady, the chances of inheriting a cool quarter of a mill any time soon are slim, that is, if Miriam is willing to wait and let nature take its course - which she isn't. Enter Tolbert and a scheme which tests his conviction for the con.

This was just okay. There are some nice characters and minor complementary story-lines which were fun but overall, the plot was dull and failed to deliver much by way of mystery or entertainment.

In a desperate pitch to change things up, author Gil Brewer added a dose of the supernatural which, if anything, contributed to the books downfall in my opinion.

My rating: 2.5/5 stars.

THE THREE WAY SPLIT

Buried treasure done the pulp way.

The Three Way Split was a treasure trove of fun, containing a small cast which made a big impact.

Jack Holland lives on the sea, his work sustains his oceanic lifestyle and his beautiful girlfriend warms his bed at night. He's carved a niche existence which, minor cash flow problems aside, generally keeps him content. However, a visit from his estranged father soon sees Jack wading through deeper waters than he'd imagined, ones where blood mixes with salt water, and dangerous currents threaten to pull him under for a long slept among the fishes.

The linear plot is breezy and free flowing while the pacing reflects situation; manic. This is a great example of a pitch perfect pulp in holiday mode.

My rating: 4.5/5 stars. Definitely the better of the two novels in the collection.

DIG THAT CRAZY CORPSE

Hard boiled PI story complete with all the genre staples. Nothing especially memorable about it but the narrative did have a nice clear flow and the linear plot made for easy reading. I wouldn’t mind reading more of this PI who hints at the unconventional bordering on atypical.

3/5 stars.

LOVE... AND LUCK

Short sexy noir about a (presumably) promiscuous married woman and her former flame who’s in town to wreck her marriage and boy does he!

4/5 stars

INDISCRETION

A sexy housewife who loves to cheat on her husband with strange men. Abused and misused she craves more, her husband unsuspecting all the whole. Erotic noir.

5/5 stars

Overall this is a solid collection which fans of Gil Brewer and pulp in general will not want to miss. I'd give this collection 4/5 stars.

[David · Rating 3 out of 5]

(The following review does not contain spoilers; the plot element described below does not appear in the published version of A Devil for O'Shaugnessy.) In 1973, with his career in decline for more than a decade, Gil Brewer completed a new noir thriller, A Devil for O’Shaugnessy. A throwback, the novel would have fit as one of his lesser Gold Medal paperbacks of the late 1950s, memorable primarily for the appearance of a deranged pet monkey as a major character. Brewer’s agent submitted the manuscript to Coward, McCann, and the publisher sent detailed suggestions for revision, including the possibility that “there might be a neater ending in which Fisk and Miriam are killed together (in a chase scene, for example).” Brewer dutifully responded to the publisher’s criticisms, only to have his revision rejected outright. In their kiss-off letter, Coward, McCann made substantial (and legitimate) objections to aspects of the plot that they had implicitly endorsed previously. As well, they panned Brewer’s new ending, complaining that “the car chase, another cliché, seems an awfully familiar device. Haven’t we seen this already too many times before?” Feel Gil Brewer’s pain.

[Andy · Rating 4 out of 5]

A double-decker of prime noir dementia. A Devil For O'Shaughnessy reminded me of the movie Two Of A Kind starring Edmond O'Brien and Lizabeth Scott about a man trained to pretend to be a missing heir to a fortune left to him by a dying old dowager. It's a great movie and this knock-off is equally satisfactory, except for the ludicrous addition of a manic ape thought to be the reincarnation of the master of the house. This ape screeches and jumps around the mansion all through the book.

Three-Way Split is a lot better, a maritime noir about a charter boat loser of a captain discovering buried treasure in the middle of the Gulf. Well, as they say loose lips sink ships and he spills his secret to his stupid girlfriend who spills the info to the Captain's sleazy. never-do-well father. A pair of murdering gangsters hear about the treasure and they all get forced at gunpoint to make the trip to grab the loot.

Many noir novels are cookie-cutter predictable, but Gil Brewer throws enough unexpected twists and turns in his novels to keep you riveted until the end. There's enough outrage to keep you from predicting the end of his stories.

[Kit Fox · Rating 4 out of 5]

Claustrophobic and gritty. Felt like being locked in a humid closet with a group of very desperate alcoholics. Fun for the whole family! (Also glad that Gil Brewer's getting more attention these days.)

[Deliah Lawrence · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was my first time reading a novel by Gil Brewer and I was not disappointed. Although there were two mysteries and a few short stories in between, this review is solely based on A Devil for O’Shaugnessy.

Meet Tolbert O’Shaugnessy, a con artist who uses the brandy bottle to ease his pain and who chews Tums like it is candy. Tolbert meets Miriam who cooks up a plan (The Big Con) to kill her Grandma and get a large payday of over a million dollars. Here’s the catch…he would have to pose as her cousin, Joseph Lancaster who has been declared dead in England but Grandma doesn’t know about his death.

Brewer weaves a very interesting noir story filled with colorful characters and even a rambunctious monkey named Gargantua who Grandma is convinced is her deceased husband, Desmond sending messages and protecting her. The dialogue was spot on and the mystery unfolded nicely in the midst of Tolbert/Joseph falling in love with Ann Elliot, Grandma’s companion-secretary and realizing that he couldn’t go through with the con.

Although there were a few typographical errors, I thoroughly enjoyed the storyline and would definitely read other novels by this author.

Two thumbs up!

My favorite lines:
“Grandma,” I said, feeling suddenly worse than ever about the entire thing.

She moved toward me, hands still out, beginning to snuffle now. Then she ran to me, flung her arms around my shoulders, sobbing. The sobbing began to alter, changing into laughter; and I could smell lavender perfume. Pressed against me, I could feel her bones; she was like loosely stretched cloth strung over sticks. It was as if I could feel the sticks, her bones, move brokenly about.

“Joseph, Joseph,” she said, laughing around the words. “I knew you’d come home, I knew it. Desmond tells me it’s only a question of time, and here you are.” She gagged a little, snuffling, and turned her face up to me, smiling. She was feeling my arms now, pressing, grabbing with her fingers, checking to make sure I wasn’t a mirage. “My little boy,” she said, “My boy’s come home.”

“Yes, Grandma.”

“Isn’t it wonderful?” Miriam said absently.

[Douglass Loess · Rating 4 out of 5]

Both novels-- 4 stars. Quotes: "Something inside we cried out for surcease--surcease, nepenthe. I would never find it, never. I knew that (115: a bit of play on Poe)." "Brundell said in his soft fleshless voice. There was absolutely no timbre. It was like white wisps of milkweed astir on a gentle balm (98)." "Even so, now I was conscious of her body under that dress. She must have been wearing a silk slip. Her body seemed to slither under the cloth of the dress. There was quite a bit about this one. She emanated a sexuality that could not be denied. It was in her tone, in her pink tongue, in every movement she made. There was an impression of familiarity, of closeness. She generated need (58)." "Soon a bright new day would begin and I would be in the middle of it, like a fly pinned to a sheet of paper (90)." "'You're so--so damned--' 'That's a fact, my dear (48)."

[Chris Stephens · Rating 4 out of 5]

A Devil....got reincarnated people in monkeys, massive drinking issues, fucked up women and men to be fair, nothing is as it seams, classic Brewer, but, you can feel the booze taking over the writing imo.

[Michael · Rating 5 out of 5]

A Devil for O'Shaugnessy was unpublished during Gil Brewer's troubled lifetime but is clearly top-form for Brewer. There is more wit, deep insight and creative wordsmithing in the first 2 pages of this novel than others of his genre were ever able to produce. Like all good Brewer stories this one reeks of booze, hard times and missed opportunities.

The Three-way Split is a good novel; a little more adventure oriented than the first novel. In between are 3 short stories which tend to be a little conceptual and not up to the quality of his novels. The first short story reads like one of those hack, pulp stories from the thirties (though written in the fifties) with a wacky private dick and corny dialogue. Hard to believe Brewer wrote it.

This gets 5 stars based on that first novel.

[Ed · Rating 5 out of 5]

A top-notch twofer from Stark House, including Gil Brewer's never-before-published A DEVIL FOR O'SHAUGNESSY. A DEVIL combines Brewer's unique noir voice with a streak of Southern Gothic in it. Great fun. THE THREE-WAY SPLIT is about a shipwreck and treasure, tightly written and well-plotted. Nice contrast to DEVIL.

[Victor Whitman · Rating 3 out of 5]

Liked these. Don't expect to find plausible plots from Gil Brewer but these were two fast paced novels, one humorous tale that went unpublished for 40 years, and Brewer's take on the sunken treasure story set off the coast of the Florida Keys. This collection also includes three fairly decent short stories and two essays.

[Jaime · Rating 4 out of 5]

A Devil For O'Shaugnessy is hands-down nifty noir. Loved it.