Paperback Confidential: Crime Writers of the Paperback Era - Softcover

Ritt, Brian

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1933586613 ISBN 13: 9781933586618

Publisher: Stark House Press, 2013

Synopsis

132 profiles of the men and women who wrote the books that became the backbone of the Pulp and Paperback Era from the 1930s through the 1960s. Each profile contains details about the author's life and explores key works; also covered are screenplay and teleplay work, as well as movies based on the authors' stories.

About this title

About the Author

Brian Ritt has written about vintage paperbacks for Paperback Parade, The Paperback Fanatic, and contributed an introduction to Stark House's Orrie Hitt omnibus. Rick Ollerman is the Associate Editor of Stark House Press.

From the Inside Flap

These are the authors who turned out the dark noirs and hardboiled thrillers, private detective puzzles and psychological suspense, police procedurals and backwood melodramas, stories of passion and cold-blooded murder. 132 profiles of the men and women who wrote the books that became the backbone of the Pulp and Paperback Era from the 1930s through the 1960s.Here you will find information on the acknowledged masters like Dashiell Hammett, Raymond Chandler, James M. Cain and Cornell Woolrich... the rack mainstays like Gil Brewer, Brett Halliday, Day Keene, and Charles Williams... and the unjustly forgotten like Malcolm Braly, Elisabeth Sanxay Holding, Ennis Willie and Douglas Sanderson.Each profile contains details about the author's life and explores key works, with special attention paid to series characters. Also covered are screenplay and teleplay work, as well as movies based on the authors' stories.Paperback Confidential also includes a handy PseudoDex with all the various names these authors wrote under, and a section for each author with further recommendations for the reader's consideration.

Reviews

Even crime-fiction fans who consider themselves well versed in the paperback-original mysteries of the 1940s and ’50s, the era of Hammett, Chandler, Goodis, Woolrich, Thompson, et al, will find plenty of new information in this endlessly fascinating compendium. Each entry includes biographical data, a synopsis of the author’s career, a bibliography of his or her writings, and even a few read-alike suggestions. Although many of the titles listed are out of print, plenty of them are available from used-book dealers. Fans will want to keep this one at the ready when they visit their favorite paperback outlets. --Bill Ott

Edition details

• Publisher: Stark House Press
• Publication date: 2013
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1933586613
• ISBN 13: 9781933586618
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 344