Lest Dent's Only Gold Medal Paperback

Cry at Dusk by Lester Dent

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


Cry at Dusk is part adventure pulp and part hardboiled crime novel. Pulp writers from the golden age like Lester Dent tended to always write adventure serials even when writing PBOs for Gold Medal. Another case that comes to mind is Cornell Woolrich's The Savage Bride which owes more to Rider Haggard than to his crime novels of the 40s.

What was interesting about the first half of Cry at Dusk--and the cover suggest this as well--is that it reads pretty much like a typical GM crime novel, but then turns into an exotic adventure of lost treasure.



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We All Killed Grandma by Fredric Brown

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


Sometimes Fredric Brown's premises are a little far-fetched. But, if you buy into them you're generally rewarded with a good read. We All Killed Grandma is a classic example. A man discovers the body of his murdered grandmother and immediately lapses into amnesia leaving him to try to solve a murder of which he himself might be guilty.



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So Young, So Wicked by Jonathan Craig

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


Wow, started off the year with a bang! This one from 1957 by Jonathan Craig is truly an undiscovered treasure of the Gold Medal era. It has all the necessary elements to make for a hardboiled crime novel. Especially the femme fatale, in this case a 15-year-old girl, and the twist ending.



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