Steve Harrison's Casebook

by Robert E. Howard, Don Herron (Introduction), Rob Roehm (Editor)

Presenting the complete collection of Robert E. Howard's private eye stories starring Steve Harrison! Everything in this volume - stories, drafts, synopses - was pulled directly from Howard's own typescripts, including an early draft of "Graveyard Rats," the most terrifying of Harrison's adventures. In these pages you will enter a nightmarish world that blends weird mystery and heart-stopping horror, with Steve Harrison as your guide, a powerful man who is more likely to tear into a fight with a mace or a battle axe than a gun. Harrison has more in common with Howard's sword-swinging Conan than Hammett's Continental Op, but he helps to establish the roots of a noir style that would later find success with Mickey Spillane's Mike Hammer.
Harrison might walk the mean streets and back alleys of the 1930s, but he has the soul of a barbaric savage, possessed by the crimson instinct for slaughter.

Genres: Fantasy, Occult Detective, Fiction, Mystery

312 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2010

About the author

Robert Ervin Howard was an American pulp writer of fantasy, horror, historical adventure, boxing, western, and detective fiction. Howard wrote "over three-hundred stories and seven-hundred poems of raw power and unbridled emotion" and is especially noted for his memorable depictions of "a sombre universe of swashbuckling adventure and darkling horror."

He is well known for having created—in the pages of the legendary Depression-era pulp magazine Weird Tales—the character Conan the Cimmerian, a.k.a. Conan the Barbarian, a literary icon whose pop-culture imprint can only be compared to such icons as Tarzan of the Apes, Count Dracula, Sherlock Holmes, and James Bond.

—Wikipedia

Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name.

Reviews

[Chiara · Rating 4 out of 5]

Un 3 piatto che alzo soltanto per l'inclusione delle parodie poliziesche, che ho adorato

[Austin Smith · Rating 3 out of 5]

Continuing my read-through of Robert E. Howard's works. This one is the complete collection of his hardboiled crime stories featuring the character Steve Harrison. Below are my ratings for each story.

Lord of the Dead - 3⭐

The People of the Serpent - 3⭐

The Teeth of Doom - 2.75⭐

The Black Moon - 3.25⭐

The Voice of Death - 2.75⭐

The House of Suspicion - 3⭐

The Names in the Black Book - 3.25⭐

The Silver Heel - 3⭐

Graveyard Rats - 3.5⭐

Overall REH's crime stories were good/decent but nothing too spectacular. Still, I always enjoy reading his work and look forward to the many other stories he wrote.

[Vincent Darlage · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was an excellent collection of stories, and each story had its wonderful merits. Personally, I thought the stories just got better and better, with an excellent culmination with "Graveyard Rats," which had a very satisfying mix of horror, violence and mystery.

[Little Timmy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent collection of the stories about a little known Howard character. The stories, as usual with Howard's writing, are full of fast paced action and adventure. Highly recommended.

[Micah Atkinson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent Hard Boiled Detective stories by the master, Robert E. Howard.
In a similar vein to Mickey Spillane and each story gets better!
Recommended!

[Ståle Gismervik · Rating 5 out of 5]

I've read this book before (the first edition) and currently re-reading it. It's a great collection of detective stories by the great Robert E. Howard. What a fantastic author. He wrote in several genres.

Though he claimed to dislike writing detective stories he certainly did them very well. Absolutely worth reading.

For some, it might not feel politically correct but remember these stories were written a long time ago and while they don't feel outdated there are certain words which were commonly used then that are not acceptable now. I'm not bothered by this since that was the way it was, even if it wasn't right. You can't censor stories written that long ago and these haven't been.

[Rich Clabaugh · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not one of my favorite Robert E. Howard collection of stories. Police Detective Harrison patrols the dangerous streets of China town. Written in the 1930s, plenty of cringeworthy racial stereotypes.

[D J Rout · Rating 2 out of 5]

The intelligent introduction ot this book makes a comparison between Dashiell Hammett, Raymond Chandler, Howard and Mickey Spillane. He points out that Howard derived some of the writing skills from Hammett, and would have become, if he'd lived, the precursor to Spillane.

Howard can't use his wordplay as well in the hardboiled genre as he can in swords and sorcery, and these stories are simply about Steve Harrison using his muscles and gun to blast his way through various problems involving the Oriental quarter of a fictional city that doesn't have the realistic descr4ipitons of San Francisco or Los Angeles that distinguishes the better writers.

Strictly for curiosity's sake.

[Jefferson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fantastic work as always, although calling these detective stories is a bit of a stretch -- it's very clear that Howard had little patience for the genre. These are really action stories in which the main character happens to be a detective, and it's a little vague as to whether he's a policeman or a private eye, demonstrating that Howard didn't care what the difference was. Viewed as action stories, however, they are excellent.

It is a pity that "The Mystery of Tannernoe Lodge" is unfinished, as it is one of the more intriguing stories in this collection, and seems to be moving Steve Harrison into the realm of supernatural horror.

[Caleb · Rating 4 out of 5]

For someone who actively detested detective stories, Robert E. Howard did a rather fine job with his own fiction of this genre. Each yarn is better than the last; “Graveyard Rats” being the very best of the bunch!