HARD CASE GO SELF PARODY

FIFTY TO ONE
CHARLES ARDAI
HARD CASE CRIME
$7.99

If there has been a more consistently good series of genre novels in recent years then I'm unaware of it. Hard Case Crime started publishing back in 2004 with Grifter's Game by Lawrence Block - back in those days I had the books on subscription from the much missed, Murder One but these days I have to trawl Amazon. I've almost got the entire set, though.

The original concept was to provide cheap, pocket sized paperback crime novels to the masses - the kind of book that used to be published in the days of the pulp. It was a risky venture at the time but thankfully the project was a great success. This was due, in my mind, to a clever back list of long out of print classics and the best of modern hardboiled writing. Names such as Lawrance Block, Max Allan Collins and Earle Stanley Gardner were among the first titles and soon the publisher were printing the likes of Ed McBain, Mickey Spillane and Stephen King.

The books would all have a uniform look and great pains went into making them look retro, like the books that once filled shops and book stands. The books were not ashamed of their pulp heritage and instead screamed of it proudly. It was edior Charles Ardai, a man who knew that pulp was not defined by low quality, hack work but by excitement, adventure and bloody good stories, well told, that was the driving force behind the project. And so it was fitting that when the company were celebrating their fiftieth title, that Charles (who had previously published two books with the company under the name Richard Aleas) should write an affenctionate spoof history of the company in the shape of a thrilling crime novel.


That novel is Fifty to One - Patricia Haverstadt comes to New York with a vision of living with her sister and carving out an exciting new life for herself. However things don't go as planned and she soon meets a man who robs her of her money, claiming it is advance rent for a room, and leaves her with a business card of what, she thinks, is an exclusive hotel for young women. However when she gets there she realises that she has been conned but does manage to get a job with a Agency in the building. Here Charley Borden puts in an appearance, running from an irate Mickey Spillane who is annoyed that the company are publishing a rip off of his Mike Hammer series. And the author has done a great job with this scene and I knew the irate man was Spillane before it was revealed in the narrative.

Patricia, now Tricia, recognises the fleeing man as the man who robbed her earlier and as soon as Spillane has left for a Miller or two, she socks the man on the nose. Eventually she befriends the book editor and agrees to write a true crime story for him. She is working in a night club for the mobster Sal Nicolazzo and so Charley persuades her to keep her eyes and ears peeled and simply write down what she witnesses. However Tricia finds nothing shady at the nightclub and so she makes up her own story detailing a $3 million heistt from the nightclub. In her story it is claimed that the events were true and that it was all hushed up else the mobster lose face. However the problem is that such a heist has taken place and was hushed up - now the mob think that both Tricia and Charley were in on the heist and know where the money is.

Planning Fifty to One out must have been a nightmare - there are so many Hard Case Crime references and in jokes that the book sails dangerously close to being indulgent at times, but there is an excitement and love in the writing that is contagious. Ardai is clearly a man passionately in love with hardboiled crime writing and his book is a love letter to past heroes. As well as a bloody good read - thrilling in places, hilarious in others. Fans of hardboiled writing will find much to appreciate here and anyone else is pretty much guaranteed a damn good read.