A SMILE ON THE FACE OF THE TIGER

Detroit shamus Amos Walker, who fills Marlowe's shoes and adds a few hardboiled scuffmarks of his own, is asked by sultry publisher Louise Starr to track down Eugene Booth, a '50s pulp writer she’d love to reprint—if only he hadn’t returned her book advance and disappeared. Immersing himself in pulpy old prose, prurient dust-jacket art, and the gossip of collectibles dealers, Walker chats up Fleta Skirrett (who’s slid from posing for old book covers into near-dementia at the Edencrest Retirement Home); meets the reclusive son of cover artist Lowell Birdsall; crosses paths with Mafia hitman-turned-bestselling confessional author Glad Eddie Cypress; and finally corrals Booth himself and a case of liquor in a fisherman's motel up north. Next morning, Booth is swinging by his belt from the cabin rafters, and Walker has stepped into a noir nightmare that began 50 years back with the murder of Booth's wife Allison and a police report Booth’s brother Duane never filed. Before murders old and new are solved, Walker will get a helluva black eye, some commitment-free loving, and a chance to mouth à la vintage Spillane.

Like Walker’s earlier adventures (Never Street, 1997, etc.), a Waspish valentine to the old Black Mask writers, with cutthroat dialogue, lovingly delivered concussions, and enough punch and plot twists to accompany another full case of booze.