Juvenile Delinquent

by Richard Deming

Manny Moon, the agile one-legged detective, is back on a case involving the son of his old friend Ed Brighton.Young Joe Brighton had been found by the police standing over the dead body of Bart Meyers, president of the Purple Pelicans - a juvenile gang to which Joe belonged. The knife used to kill Bart belonged to Joe’s father, and the police believed they had an open-and-shut case. But Manny didn’t think Joe was a killer and when he started investigating he uncovered some very dangerous information that exposed a gang of dope peddlers. Manny had to keep one step ahead of them to save his own life and clear Joe from the murder charge.

188 pages, Kindle Edition

First published April 1, 2012

About the author

Richard Deming (1915-1983) was a solid and reliable pro whose crime-writing career extended from late 1940s pulps to early 1980s digests. He also wrote several volumes of popular non-fiction late in his life.

He is most likely to be remembered as one of the most prolific contributors to Manhunt and the early days of Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine and as a paperback original writer, sometimes of novels based on TV shows (Dragnet, The Mod Squad, and under the pseudonym Max Franklin, Starsky and Hutch). He was also a frequent ghost for the Ellery Queen team on paperback originals and for Brett Halliday on lead novelettes for Mike Shayne Mystery Magazine.

Reviews

[Dave · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book features Deming's PI, Manny Moon, a one legged detective who lost his leg in WWII. He wrote four Manny Moon books, all of which have been reissued, Gallows in my Garden, Tweak the Devil's
Nose, Give the Girl a Gun, and Juvenile Delinquent, which was apparently first published in Manhunt in 1955.

Ed Brighton needs Moon's help because his son Joe is facing a murder charge. Joe was involved with the purple Pelicans, an early teenage criminal gang. The murder weapon, found in the victim's chest,
belonged to Ed and it appeared to be a killing to advance Joe from VP to President of the club as the corpse had been the club president.

Ed had saved Moon from a beating when Moon started working on the docks and had been Moon's trainer when Moon took up boxing. There was no charge for this investigation.

It's the early fifties and the concept of teenage gangs is new. Part of the story is an introduction to the gang world of the early fifties complete with rumbles and taking off jackets before rumbles. The girls
all wear ponytails with purple ribbons for the gang.

It's a time a lot more innocent than today and Deming feels compelled to explain to the reader about gangs and drugs and codes of silence. Similar in tone to Orvis' The Damned and The Destroyed, there's a
preachiness to this book which serves to date it a little.

It's compelling and quick reading like most of Deming's work, but it
doesn't have the depth of a Goodis or Cain book.