The Dice Man by Luke Rhinehart

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


This is one of those cult books that was in my TBR pile for decades. The Dice Man is part Been Down So Long It Looks Up to Me and part Naked Lunch. This was my second attempt at reading it, the first being in the mid-90s when I saw a pile of copies in a bookstore with a sign that read, "This book will change your life . . ." I thought, boy I should really get around to reading it if people are still so enthusiastic about 20 years later. I could only get about 80 pages into it. This time I stuck out and it paid off--a little--a little more than I expected, at least. But it did take me a month to plow through it.

It's an interesting premise--a psychiatrist who decides to add randomness to his life by assigning the options for every decision in his life to numbers on a die and then casting the die and allowing it to dictate which option to choose. He then starts to treat his patients with his dice therapy to some spectacular success but, mostly, to dismal failure. But the dice therapy idea catches on and becomes a cult, a kind of religion, eventually becoming a national phenomenon, despite being discredited by leading authorities.

The novel is a bit dated, written as it was in 1971, but does accurately reflect the time period of the book, specifically, August 1968 to April 1971, when the world seemed obsessed with finding new ways of living and elevating spiritual awareness though drugs or different religions. The Dice Man is essentially a satire of the time.



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The Lustful Ape by Russell Gray (Bruno Fischer)

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


This was the only book, to my knowledge, that was published as both a Lion and Gold Medal paperback. It was published as by Russell Gray with Lion and under his real name, Bruno Fischer, with Gold Medal.

Good early 50s PBO. You always get your money's worth with Fischer. Although his books are seldom great, they are never bad. I know that sounds like I'm damning him with faint praise, but let me assure you he's always an enjoyable read, but I wouldn't necessarily recommend him to somebody who doesn't normally read 50s pulp.



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The Expendable Man by Dorothy B. Hughes

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


I've always wanted to read a book by Dorothy Hughes. I'm not sure why I started with her last book, The Expendable Man (1962), except for the fact that it has been recently republished.

If her last book is any indication of her oeuvre, her work is similar in quality and style to Patricia Highsmith's.

I was floored by the revelation that comes a third of the way through the book. She so skillfully manipulates the narrative that, if you're not paying close attention, you'll get blindsided.

I would have given this five stars if there had been a little more drama and action, which the story could have easily have had.



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Wild by Gil Brewer

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


This has all the right ingredients for a good hardboiled read--not just one femme fatale, but two, two sisters no less. There's lots of gun play, the protagonist getting clubbed in the head, beat up, hacked-up corpses, sex in the back of cars and rye whisky. And this was written in 1958.

I would actually give it three and a half stars if I could, rather than four. The downside of the novel is that it really doesn't have a strong plot and not all that well-written. I suspect that Brewer was drunk while writing it and tried to let the story write itself.

Favorite line: "A Slow wind came in across Tampa Bay, like the hot breath of an eager woman."



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Love Goes to Buildings on Fire: Five Years in New York That Changed Music Forever by Will Hermes

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


A really good survey of five years (1973-77) of the New York music scene that changed the music world. Two related aspects struck me as I read Love Goes to Buildings on Fire, which borrows its title from the Talking Heads song of that name. The first was how diverse the music scene was in the 1970s and the second was how knowledgeable the author, Will Hermes, is about all the types of music he surveys in the book, i.e., punk, Latin, disco, experimental, etc. Only a writer who truly loves music can write informatively about all genres. There's a lot in here about Patti Smith, The Talking Heads, The Ramones and Bruce Springsteen all told in a breezy, but lucid style.



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Peppermint Twist: The Mob, the Music, and the Most Famous Dance Club of the '60s by John Johnson Jr.

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


Peppermint Twist is a great biography of a New York City Institution and the mobsters who created it. A lot of the ties to the music business that the mafia was rumored to have back in the 1960s are covered in this interesting history of the Peppermint Lounge.

If you read this book, let me recommend watching the movie Hey Let's Twist (1961), which is covered in the book and was shot (although I think it was just exterior shots) in the Peppermint Lounge.

If three of your favorite subjects are New York City history, the mob and music this book is a must. If even one of those subjects is of interest, you'll find enough of it to make reading Peppermint Twist enjoyable.



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The Cocktail Waitress by James M. Cain

My rating: 2 of 5 stars


Once, years ago, while buying a couple of Black Lizard editions of James M. Cain books, the cashier looked at the books, frowned slightly and said, "You know, he only wrote three good novels. The rest are crap." I was as much surprised by this opinion of Cain's oeuvre as I was at finding a bookstore cashier who had actually read all of Cain's novels.

With every subsequent book I've read of Cain's since The Postman Always Rings Twice, Mildred Pierce and Double Indemnity, I've begun to fear that that cashier might have been right after all.

Cain's writing is at times mediocre, which tends to point to the quality or amount of editing by publishers. The Cocktail Waitress is no exception, or, I should say, the first half of it. It would appear that Charles Ardai, the editor, took more of a hand in the latter part of the novel and, interestingly enough, the writing improves vastly as the story goes on. But unless you've read and enjoyed Cain's later books, you might not like this one.

Although Charles Ardai seems to have information that the book was written around 1975, the book is actually set in about 1961 or '62. I suppose, judging from the number of manuscripts Charles uncovered, Cain might have originally started the book in the early to mid-sixties and reworked it over and over again until his death.



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Redheads Die Quickly and Other Stories by Gil Brewer

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


Professor David Rachels, English professor and crime blogger has launched his career as a scholar of 1950s crime fiction with this collection of Gil Brewer's short stories he's put together. His well-written introduction is the most information on Brewer's life I've read since Bill Pronzini's sketch on Mystery File and only hints at his tortured life.

One aspect of Brewer's writing that comes into sharp focus with the reading of this collection is his misogyny. What an interesting case study this book would be for the student of psychoanalysis. Just about every one of the 25 stories collected here has as its focus a depraved, scheming, evil woman who brings the mail protagonist to his demise, be it physically, emotionally or spiritually.

Besides the informative introduction there is a complete bibliography of Brewer's short fiction. Suffice it to say there are enough uncollected Brewer stories to fill quite a few more volumes and, in fact, David has said that he's working on a volume of Brewer's unpublished stories.

If I could find any fault with this nearly perfect collection it would simply be with the title. I don't think the story, "Redheads Die Quickly" was very representative in plot or title of the rest of the stories contained therein. In fact, it was one of only three stories that didn't feature a femme fatale and actually one of the weaker stories. I think David probably chose it as the title story because its a good noir title. But I think the book would have been better titled My Lady is a Tramp and Other Stories, or better yet, Femme Fatales: Stories by Gil Brewer.

Bottom line: If you're a fan of noir fiction, especially if you're a fan of Gil Brewer's, this volume is a must.


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