David’s Comments (group member since Sep 17, 2018)

David’s comments from the Point Blank group.

Over the past couple days I've been reading a couple anthologies of French decadent and 19th century horror tales--Excellent stuff. For mysteries, I recently read my first by Dolores Hitchens, "The Man Who Cried All the Way Home." A competent and fairly complex murder mystery that I very much enjoyed but that surely won't stick me with. Better still was "Pure Poison," a Fred Fellows police procedural by Hillary Waugh. Waugh is, I think, nowadays underappreciated, totally out of print, and barely read; however, I think his procedurals still hold up, especially because they never fell into a formula.

Wait a minute: Tiger by the Tail is a James Hadley Chase novel. I meant End of the Tiger.

I've only read two John D. MacDonald novels (The Executioners and Soft Touch), as well as one collection of stories (Tiger by the Tail), and all were good. I'm given to understand, though, that they are among his best.
I was going to join in the reading of A Flash of Green this month, but I don't know about that now, what with it sounding underwhelming; perhaps I'll read a different stand-alone MacDonald in its stead. Any particular recommendations?

Read "Benny Muscles In" by Peter Rabe. It's good, but like the other Rabe I've read, I wasn't so overwhelmed with enthusiasm for the book as some other readers. (That may partly be because both novels were gangster themed, which isn't my favorite crime sub-genre.)

Hey-o!

I haven't read Flash of Green (or much MacDonald), so I'll certainly check that one out when the time comes.

A few years ago I read the "Lone Wolf" series, partly in paperbacks that I own and partly ebooks. At this point, all the books of the series are entirely indistinguishable to me, so I couldn't comment on which are better or worse, though I recall finding the thing as a whole diverting enough. I've actually never read any of Don Pendleton's Executioner series, whose success I assume Malzberg's books were trying to ride, but maybe I'll give it a shot someday.

The most recently crime book I've read is "45 Murderers" by Craig Rice (1952). It's my first Rice, though it's almost certainly an uncharacteristic effort in that it's 45 short true crime tales and not a screwball crime novel. Fun enough--a bit like watching Forensic Files without the forensics--and it ended with a longer than average piece on the the then relatively recent Black Dahlia murder.

I judged too hastily! I see by the back-catalogue that The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo is indeed an outlier. Not that I have anything against the book, but it doesn't really sound like my sort of thing--and it's long to boot--so I probably won't join in this month. Still and all, I'll be sure to try out one of the older podcasts.

I'm not familiar with this podcast, though I've got to question the cred of hosts who have the whole wide world of often unexplored noir, hardboiled, and pulp fiction to choose from and decide on reading...."The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo."