Arthur Kirby - High Summer Homicide - Sexton Blake Library/Fleetway - 503/1962 - Hank Janson

 

Arthur Kirby - High Summer Homicide - Sexton Blake Library 503/1962 - Fleetway

Credited to "Arthur Kirby as told to Richard Williams". In fact, it was written by Stephen Frances (aka Hank Janson) with revisions by W Howard Baker and George Paul Mann.

Artwork credited to `Camps` (full name Angel Badia Camps)

High Summer Homicide reads like two stories welded together. I can`t help thinking that too many authors were involved in this, seemingly with no-one taking an overall view.

The first section begins in a mildly Chandleresque vein, slightly laughable as the story is set somewhere near Worthing. 

Quite quickly this gives way to plain bad writing ("her long, silver-blonde hair jogged provocatively in a pony tail with every step that she took") as the fictitious storyteller, Blake`s journalist friend Arthur `Splash` Kirby leers lasciviously and longingly over an assortment of females. He seems surprised to find that women have legs, and this gives him great pleasure, though in my experience, it`s not that unusual  for them to possess these appendages. 

Unfortunately all this excitement doesn`t progress the story, which concerns a friend of Kirby`s who is missing, presumed murdered. 

I was about to give up, but on page 26 Blake takes charge of the case and the style of writing changes, so much so that one character has a complete personality transplant.

The story that emerges from this point on is really not too bad - maybe not great, but good enough.  There is a very well-written account of an undersea search for a body which gives a glimpse of the story this could have been. 

Really, it would have taken very little time effort to have made a better job of this. It`s not the worst story I`ve ever read, it`s certainly not the best. It could very easily have been better. 

 

     

Richard Williams - Somebody Wants Me Dead - Sexton Blake Libray 4/500 1960

Richard Williams - Somebody Wants Me Dead - Sexton Blake Library - 4/500 - 1960

Credited to `Richard Williams`, this story was in fact the work of Stephen Frances, better known as Hank Janson.

In the first part of the book, the central character is the marvellously-named Harry Snogg, a professional detective story writer, author of the hard-boiled Ryley Steele series of crime novels.

He is also as impressionable as wet putty, so when he stumbles upon an ongoing bank robbery by chance, it isn`t long before he becomes Ryley Steele - in his own mind, if not to anyone else !

Soon Sexton Blake is involved, and growing more than a little weary of hapless Harrys` attempts at sleuthing.

If the first part of the story is concerned largely with Harry/Ryley, the second is more concerned with Blake. While the first part has its` flashes of humour and the odd writerly flourish ("The first hint of approaching night blunted the brightness of the day."), the second is more terse, the action more hard-hitting.

Its` interesting how Mr Williams/Jansen seems to have adapted himself well to writing SBLs. Had I read this blindfold (so to speak), I would have assumed it was the work of W Howard Baker. Jansen was the author of another `Richard Williams` Blake tale,  The Iron Box, and that also fits seamlessly into the genre.

I`ve read this several times, which is why my copy is falling apart, and always enjoyed it. If you`re looking for a blend of humour, crime and detection, this is very likely the one for you.