Jacoby's First Case

The format is approximately 5.625 inches by 8.5 inches. [4], 188 pages. The dust jacket has some wear, soiling, and crease in front flap. A mystery introducing Quentin Jacoby. J. C. S. Smith is a pseudonym for a noted writer of nonfiction. Derived from a Kirkus review: Introducing Quentin Jacoby--a genuinely welcome new face and voice in the U.S. detective lineup, even if his first case isn't exactly gripping or particularly original. Jacoby's a retired subway cop living in Co-op City, missing dead wife Bea, bored with retirement, hanging out at Mount Vernon Raceway. And he narrates in an utterly engaging blend of second-generation Hammett/Chandler and second-generation New York/Jewish--very low-key, uneffort-fully funny, natural and lean and authentic. His case: he bumps into and is hired by a naive Westchester teenager to find a runaway girlfriend; she soon turns up dead, one in a series of young-girl victims. Among the many familiar lines of inquiry: a local doctor who's been playing daddy to kids with problems; the doc's connection with horse-racing and hoods; the doc's angry wife and son; a nurse who may be heading a teen-prostitute ring. Quentin Jacoby is a winner of a narrator-hero--as he takes buses, tolerates his Puerto Rican chum's vulgarity, observes human nature, thinks about food, and reflects a whole world of lower-middle-class N.Y. living that's overlooked in fiction. He makes this mystery dandy reading--and when he gets a case worthy of him, Jacoby could zoom fight to the top of the class. First Edition [stated], presumed first printing.…