The Chase: "Penny-Pinching Boarding House Owners" 2/8/53
You might think that stealing money from a dead man would be a safe way of getting rich, but you'd be wrong.
Click HERE to listen or download.
Friday, July 3, 2026
Thursday, July 2, 2026
Short Story Genre Survey, Part 7
Cover artist uncredited
Today, we turn to a life of crime.
Adventure
Horror
In the 1950s, there was a surfeit of writers who could turn out crackerjack hard-boiled crime stories on a regular basis. It was a Golden Age for the genre.
One of those writers is Gil Brewer. His story "With This Gun" is an example of how good he was. Published in the March 1951 issue of Detective Tales, the story is just eight pages long. Within that eight pages, Brewer introduces and defines the key characters, sets up the situation and brings it all to a satisfying conclusion.
Danny is a man who had done some petty thefts when he was young. His older brother Tad was already a crook, but didn't want Danny going down the same road. So he beat the crap out of Danny.
After a stint in the army, Danny opens a bar and does okay for himself. But then he meets the sexy bombshell Joan. Soon, Danny is in love with her, but she wants more out of life than what Danny can give her. The small bar isn't enough. But what if Danny robs the weekly receipts of a swanky beach club that's near his bar? THEN Joan will be happy and they can get married.
That Joan is a double-crossin' femme fatale is obvious to any reader. So you read along expecting her to either run out on Danny with the money or kill him. But her plan is actually more complex. And perhaps Danny's brother Tad might have a role to play in all this.
It's a great story, siccinct without being rushed with an unexpected twist at the end. It's a prime example of exactly why the 1950s was indeed a Golden Age for hard-boiled fiction.
I'm afraid I don't have a link to find this one online. It is included in the superb anthology of Brewer's fiction Redheads Die Quickly.
Wednesday, July 1, 2026
Basil The Royal Cat
cover art by Tom DeAngelo
Like Travelin' Toughy; like Beanbags; like Sir Spot the Lion-Hearted Leopard; like Tommy the Time-Travelin' Cat; like Super Rabbit. Basil the Royal Cat had a tragically short career (4 issues) before disappearing into Comic Book Limbo.
Basil's first issue (January 1953) starts off with a fun story that effectively introduces us to the protagonist. Basil is king of a nation of cats. He wants to impress the Princess, because he likes her.
He shares his concern with Fagin, his prime minister. Fagin, though, sees this as an opportunity to do away with Basil and take over the kingdom. He proposes that the king fight Leo the Unbeaten Lion in the Arena. But he won't really fight Leo. Instead, Fagin will put on a lion costume and throw the fight.
Of course, Fagin is planning on allowing the real Leo to fight the unsuspecting Basil.
Basil, who doesn't come across as the brightest bulb in the lamp, falls for this. He enters the Arena during the Games, announcing that he will fight Leo armed with only a chair. Fagin doesn't even wait for the seemingly inevitable conclusion.
Basil wins via pure dumb luck. He does indeed impress the Princess, then (still having no idea Fagin set him up) goes back to the palace to see Fagin. Fagin's parrot rats out the rotten prime minister. Fagin runs for it. Basil finds out he fought a real lion and faints.
The unidentified writer and artist Tony DeAngelo gave us a charming, funny tale with a protagonist who might be less than competent but is certainly likeable. Basil's career, as I said, will be short. But like so many other short-lived comic book characters, the world is better because of his existence.
Next week--oh, what the heck. I like Basil. We'll take a look at another of his adventures next week.
Monday, June 29, 2026
Cover Cavalcade
JUNE IS AVENGERS vs JLA MONTH!!!
February 1976: The Avengers cover is by Gil Kane and the JLA cover by Dick Giordano.
Friday, June 26, 2026
Friday's Favorite OTR
Black Museum: "The Canvas Bag" 1952
A woman makes an unwise decision regarding what man she runs off with.
Click HERE to listen or download.
Thursday, June 25, 2026
Short Story Genre Survey, Part 6
cover artist unidentified
Today, we ride out to the Wild West.
Adventure
Crime
Horror
Elmore Leonard's sparse, powerful prose made just about every short story he wrote a fascinating and engrossing read. He dived right into a story, pulling the reader in with him and not letting that reader go until the story ended,
For example, there's "Apache Medicine" (originally titled "Medicine"). Published in the May 1952 issue of Dime Western Magazine, it starts with an army scout named Kleecan meeting a drunken Indian while out on the trail.
The Indian is Juan Pony, the beloved son of Pondichay. Pondichay is a skilled warrior and leader who has only recently been brought back to the reservation at the cost of 41 dead soldiers and civilians, so getting him mad again would not be a good idea.
But Juan is drunk and feeling bloodthirsty. Kleecan, defending himself, has no choice but to kill him.
He buries the body, but knows it's likely that Pondichay will eventually find the grave and want vengeance. Kleecan, though, doesn't have that much time to worry about it before he's taken hostage by four outlaws who force him to be their guide.
This, though, might be a good thing. Kleecan has two problems--Pondichay and the outlaws. But, if can work things correctly, he might be able to use the latter problem to solve the former.
It's a short story--only 10 pages as reprinted in The Complete Western Stories of Elmore Leonard. But it doesn't feel rushed or abrupt. Leonard was a master of picking the exact right words to tell a story without picking too many words. In these ten pages, he tells a story that properly introduces the characters and gives us a proper beginning, middle, and very satisfying ending.
You can read the story yourself HERE.
Wednesday, June 24, 2026
Blowing up Yet Another Super Weapon!
cover art by Walt Simonson
Remember where we were? Luke, Leia, the droids and Chewie are aboard the Tarkin, the Empire's new superweapon. They want to destroy it. Darth Vader is also aboard and, sensing Luke's presence, is setting a trap. A cadre of Imperial officers, tired of their comrades regularly getting force-choked by Vader, are planning to assassinate him.
In this issue, we learn that Lando, who had not been assigned to the mission, stowed away on the Millennium Faclon to prove he is indeed now a loyal member of the Rebellion.
This latter plot twist is a happy one, as Lando manages to run a con on some stormtroopers to keep them from confiscating the ship.
Aboard the Tarkin, the Rebel party splits up. Chewie and the droids are to take out the power source for the tractor beam, which Chewie does in a magnificent manner--he throws a stormtrooper into the generator.
Leia is to secure an escape pod for leaving the ship. She doesn't have as much luck. Though she kills a number of stormtroopers, she has to run for it.
Luke is taking an explosive to the reactor room that powers the superweapon. Vader is waiting for him, but one of those dissatisfied officers opens an airlock in an attempt to blow Vader into space. Both he and Luke manage to claw their way to safety, but Luke has lost his chance to sabotage the weapon.
With some help from R2, who plugs into the ship's computer and uses a deluge of fire-fighting foam to help Luke escape from stormtroopers, everyone rejoins near the hangar deck.
They steal a transport and escape the Tarkin. Lando, in the Falcon, saves them from some TIE fighters and takes them aboard. Vader comes after them with his personal fighter, but Luke improvises a tactic that leaves Vader's ship damaged.
The Tarkin attempts to destroy the Falcon with the superweapon, but it turns out that Leia, while running from the escape pods, had taken an opportunity to rewire the weapon. It essentially backfires and blows up the Tarkin.
As I mentioned last week, Star Wars Expanded Universe stories revisited the "Empire has a new superweapon" idea too often, but individual examples of this were often great stories in and of themselves. THIS is a great story. The action aboard the Tarkin is fast-paced, exciting and allows eash of the protagonists to show off his or her skills. Lando's surprise inclusion fits into the tale perfectly. The idea of Imperial officers wanting to kill Vader because he's always killing them is an excellent idea. Simonson's art continues to bring this version of the Star Wars universe to vivid life.
And Chewie destroying the tractor beam by throwing a stormtrooper into it is the best thing ever.
Next week, we'll return to Earth and visit Basil the Royal Cat.
Monday, June 22, 2026
Cover Cavalcade
JUNE IS AVENGERS vs JLA MONTH!!!
Friday, June 19, 2026
Friday's Favorite OTR
Dragnet: "The Big Press" 6/15/50
Thursday, June 18, 2026
Short Story Genre Survey, Part 5
Adventure
Crime
Horror
Western
I've added a category. Today, we'll be looking at a mystery that is a traditional whodunit. I realized that we also need a category for hard-boiled crime stories. Some of them do have a whodunit element, but its not a necessary component and I think you can consider traditional mysteries and noirish crime tales to be separate genres.
Anyway, as I said, we'll be looking at a traditional whodunit--this one by the Queen of Whodunits, Agatha Christie. Gee whiz, the woman was brilliant. Her mysteries are fair-play. The clues are always there for us to see. But they are so casually dropped into the story that we easily miss them.
"A Christmas Tragedy" (originally titled "The Hat and the Alibi") was published in the January 1930 issue of The Story-Teller. It's part of a series of stories in which the clever Miss Marple is at a gathering with friends. In each story, a friend tells of an experience that includes a mystery. Miss Marple, of course, inevitably figures out the mystery part of it.
This time, it's Miss Marple's turn to tell a tale. And it's a good one. She tells about a time that she realized a husband was planning to murder his wife and make it look like an accident. But she has no proof and knows the wife won't believe her.
Then the wife was murdered. But it's not an accident. It's obviously a murder. She was bashed over the head in her hotel room.
But the husband has a solid alibi. He couldn't have done it. It was, the police conclude, a burglar she caught in the room.
This doesn't sit well with Miss Marple. But she concedes that the husband does indeed have an alibi for the time his wife was murdered.
Or so it seems...
It's a story I can't summarzie any further without spoilers. The clues are there and the solution is clever and satsifying. This is the sort of puzzle that Christie did better than anyone else. I'm afraid I don't have a link to take you directly to the story this time, but its worth searching out. It's available in the anthologies The Thirteen Problems and The Complete Short Stories of Agatha Christie.
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