Procure Armchair In Hell Developed By Henry Kane Represented In Print

too bad I didn't see the clue to the mystery until I finished reading, but that's typical of me.
I need to pay more attention,

I love Henry Kane's turn of phrase, for both Peter Chambers and for the supporting cast, review of
Henry Kane's Armchair in Hell
by tENTATIVELY, a cONVENIENCE October,

I don't remember whether I read mention of Kane somewhere amp bought this bk b/c of that ot whether I just found it at my favorite used bkstore amp got it b/c I figured it was promising.
Whatever the case, I've already more or less forgotten it but I think I enjoyed it as much as I usually do hardboiled detective pulp fiction w/ the exception of Mickey Spillane.
I reckon Kane's pretty typical, . but in a way I like,

"The devil was a dentist with a drill, I was in an armchair in hell,

"So I woke up: but the buzzing persisted,

"I lay stiff and supine, I lay stiff and prone, I held my breath. I let it go. I wriggled. Resolutely.

"Then I slid my head beneath the pillow and I tried to crawl in after it but I couldn't quite make it, so I kicked off my covers and I put my legs down over the edge of the bed and I palmed my hands over my ears and I hung there, miserably.


"The buzzing crystalized into sound with meaning,

"Someone had dug his finger into the hole around my doorbell, and it was endless, like music out of a juke box in the rear end of a gin mill.
" p

Do you ever read a word amp think something like I haven't seen that word for awhile! It's a pleasure, at least for me.
In this case the word is "supine", Of course, one doesn't read much about gin mills anymore but that's diferent, The narrator refers to himself as a "private richard", that's a little different, He's also hungover, that's not different, amp, of course, the person at the door is a friend who's also a client amp there's been a murder.


""What cooks"

""I've got a dame at home, "

""Lovely. "

""In bed. "

""Very lovely. "

""A brunette. "

""A brunette!" I yapped at him, nose to nose, and I waited a second, and then I went away and started pulling off my tie.
"For that I'm taken out of a warm bed and pushed around, Because the guy is a nut on blondes, "

""A dead brunette, " pp

Some guys have all the luck, I mean what're the chances of going out to pick someone up at a bar amp getting them home amp then finding out that they're dead Well, ok, that's not what happened.


"Solidly, a man sat with his back to us in the chair at the foot of the table.
Quietly. A man with a high proud plume of wavy irongray hair, I couldn't see his face, He didn't turn around. It wasn't that he was impolite it was more that a knife was in his back, high, in a corner, the snub hilt pointing back at us like a stiff tongue pushed out in derision.
" pp

Like I sd, some guys have all the luck, This guy didn't. Then there's booze.

""Have a slug of gin, " I showed him how.

""No sir," he said with admirable firmness, "I do not partake of intoxicants, I keep it for my maiden sister, She visits sometimes in the mornings"

"His eyes began to go, I shook them down. "Marmaduke," I said. "You don't look so good, I insist. "

""If you insist, sir"" pp

Do people still think of booze as a medicine As a 'pickmeup' I remember drinking "Invalid Stout" in Australia, it was supposedly healthy for invalids, I sure liked the stuff amp it was cheap.
What I like better is hardboiled detective humor, I'm not sure whether that's cheap or not,

""They have added a record to that album, Now there's an American private detective who has no wife, or sleep, or food, or rest, He drinks, drinks more, and more flirts with women, blondes mostly, who talk hard but act soft, then he drinks more, then, somewhere in the middle, he gets dreadfully beaten about, then he drinks more, then he says a few dirty words, then he stumbles around, punchdrunklike, but he is very smart and he adds up a lot of two's and two's, and then the case gets solved.
See what I mean"" pp

This novel's copyrighted, Notice that the detetctive "gets dreadfully beaten about" but he doesn't get killed, Do people still act that way Or do people just get killed right away I mean why take the risk that the detective might solve the case Beating the guy up but not killing him seems practically oldfashioned.


The private richard has a team,

"Scoffol and Chambers, Scoffol is short and round and beetfaced with shortcropped white hair, parted down the middle small legs, little feet, short back, and short stomach, circular and comfortably nudging the vest buttons.
I'm another kind of guy, I'm a long one with a clarkie mustache, six feet two, sort of rawboned with big shoulders or I get a new tailor.
Scoffol is the boulder I am a phosphorescent glimmer, You can wipe the glimmer off the boulder, You cannot budge the boulder, not a real bouldery boulder, Not without a derrick.

"We have a system in our business, We mind our own. Mostly, I handle the roughneck trade, Or they handle me. " p

He goes to a dance club amp he handles her,

""Too tight," she said again, suddenly, sadly,

""Sister," I said, "You're nuts. You are gorgeous and even beautiful and completely out of this world, but you're nuts, You've got a fixation. Or something. We are a couple with rare propriety, Furthermore, that's the way I dance, With you, or anyone. With my mother. "

""With your mother" Her black eyes opened and she giggled, "Like that, boy, it's incest, or whatever they call it, Just loosen up, long guy, "" pp

You know that expression I don't get even, I get odd Well, it doesn't apply here.


"I threw it with my right with the gun slanting sidewise, I threw it with everything that was left in me, bowlingball fashion, like you need a tenstrike and you hate the pins but straightaway, no English.
It caught him spruce on the point of the chin and I heard the crunch of vertebrae as his head flashed back and hit bottom, and there he was like a bent Buddhist his toes touching and his knees touching and then the great inverted arc of his belly and then his head touching and his breath came in gurgles like soda pop out

of a bottle.


"I didn't have to do it, Mostly, it was for business,

"A private richard must not absorb a licking unless he returns it twofold, approximately it is one of the rules of our outrageous game.
If not, he might as well shut up shop, " p

There must be a name for that sort of philosophy, What is it Far. . , far something

"Cry spat the wood out of his mouth, "I come on a mission of peace," he insisted, "but outside in a nice shiny car I got five boys.
If I don't show in an hour, they got pineapples, What you peel with your teeth and you throw, "

""You could get killed like that," the Butcher said,

""Me The hell with that, I'm what you call a fartalist, "

""Fatalist," I said,

""I know professor, I am making like a comic, Good, huh You ready"" p

How many of you remember that "pineapple" is slang for an American handgrenade As opposed to "potato masher" for a German one Knowing this sort of thing will get you a nice cushy job as an unpd bk reviewer someday if you keep your nose to the grindstone.


"We jelled that way, Telescoped down, it was a picture for the front cover of the Idiot's Crime Gazette with ads in the back for the water pistols.
"What the hell" I said, "What are you doing here Who's writing this story"" p

Why! I'm surprised you asked! We both are.
Anyway, Henry Kane's a pretty good writer for this sort of thing, That just goes to show how many good writers there are out there that've fallen thru the cracks, Author Henry Kane was a lawyer who seemed to prefer writing, In his career, wrote overnovels, including aboutfeaturing Peter Chambers, Other short lived series characters were PIs Marla Trent and retired NYPD detective inspector turned P, I. McGregor. He also wrote the movie adaptations for Ed McBainsth Precincts Cop Hater and The Mugger, And, in light of his experience with Chambers, Kane was the perfect choice to pen an original novel starring televisions Peter Gunn.
He also wrote under the pseudonyms Anthony McCall, Kenneth R, McKay, and Mario J. Sagola. He is the creator of Peter Chambers, a private eye in New York City, McGregor, an ex cop turned private eye in New York City, and Maria Trent.
Kane also contributed to the se Author Henry Kane was a lawyer who seemed to prefer writing, In his career, wrote overnovels, including aboutfeaturing Peter Chambers, Other short lived series characters were PIs Marla Trent and retired NYPD detective inspector turned P, I. McGregor. He also wrote the movie adaptations for Ed McBain'sth Precinct's Cop Hater and The Mugger, And, in light of his experience with Chambers, Kane was the perfect choice to pen an original novel starring television's Peter Gunn.
He also wrote under the pseudonyms Anthony McCall, Kenneth R, McKay, and Mario J. Sagola. He is the creator of Peter Chambers, a private eye in New York City, McGregor, an ex cop turned private eye in New York City, and Maria Trent.
Kane also contributed to the series of 'Ellery Queen' novels ghostwritten by other authors, sitelink.