KILLING TOWN by Mickey Spillane & Max Allan Collins

Killing Town is the tenth Mike Hammer novel started by Mickey Spillane and completed by Max Allan Collins. In Collins’ Introduction, “Meet Mike Hammer”, Killing Town’s genesis is explained. It’s an early, perhaps the earliest, Mike Hammer story Spillane started—the incomplete manuscript clocked in at 30 typed and single-spaced pages. The story takes place before I, The Jury, making it the first Mike Hammer novel, and a few elements we take for granted when reading a Hammer story are missing. Velda is nowhere in the tale, Manhattan is in Hammer’s rearview mirror, and Pat Chambers is nothing more than a voice on the telephone.

When Hammer arrives in Killington, Rhode Island, undercover and riding the rails as a hobo, he’s greeted with a strip tease and a murder rap. The frame is for the rape and murder of a young woman. The local constabulary, as foul smelling as the city’s fish cannery, is pushing Hammer to the electric chair before he’s even seen a judge. But when an alluring blonde, and the daughter of the fish cannery king, springs him with a false alibi and a marriage proposal he’s left wondering what happened and why.

Killing Town opens, in solid Spillane style, with a flash and a bang and barely wavers from beginning to end. Its trajectory fast and straight as a bullet, rifling Hammer from jailbird and murderer to knight-errant, friend and protector. The mystery is nicely controlled and the reader is as confused about what’s happening, and more importantly why it’s happening, as Hammer. The foul and corrupt setting is as beautifully hardboiled as the prose is stark and lively. An excellent addition to the Hammer canon, and my favorite, of those I’ve read, completed posthumously by Max Allan Collins.

THE BLOODY SPUR by Mickey Spillane and Max Allan Collins

The Bloody Spur is Mickey Spillane’s and Max Allan Collins’ third Western novel featuring former Wells Fargo detective and current Trinidad, New Mexico Sheriff Caleb York. Max Allan Collins wrote this smooth tale based on characters created by Spillane, for John Wayne’s Batjac Productions, in an unproduced screenplay.

The Santa Fe Railroad wants a spur between Trinidad and the nearby Las Vegas, New Mexico, but it needs a right-of-way across George Cullen’s Bar-O ranch. The new rail line would increase commerce, population, make Trinidad’s cattle ranchers more competitive, and enrich the town’s business owners. But George Cullen is a tough and stubborn old man, now blind, with no intention of allowing the tracks on Bar-O property. His opinion is unpopular with most everyone, including the Trinidad Citizens Committee, and creates an unusual hostility in town. Alver Hollis’ arrival—a gunfighter known as Preacherman—adds more tension since York thinks the gunman has come to Trinidad to kill. But Hollis’ target, or why anyone would want a Trinidad resident murdered, is a mystery.

The Bloody Spur is an enjoyable and entertaining western tale. Its traditional storyline—Sheriffs, gunfighters, ranchers, railroads—is comfortable and, in all the right places, surprising. There is a nifty mystery included, which York handles with flair and style. A romantic twist, murder, betrayal, a satisfying amount of action, and humor—provided by York’s deputy, the former town drunk—making The Bloody Spur a rewarding journey into the Old West and New Mexico’s high country.

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THE BIG SHOWDOWN by Mickey Spillane and Max Allan Collins

The Big Showdown is the follow up to Mickey Spillane’s and Max Allan Collins’ The Legend of Caleb York (2015). Caleb York is leaving Trinidad, New Mexico, where he has been sheriff since knocking down corrupted lawman and shakedown artist Harry Gauge, to take a job in the Pinkerton Detective Agency’s San Diego office. A good replacement has been found for Trinidad’s sheriff with Ben Wade, and as Caleb is saying goodbye to the girl he will regret leaving, Willa Cullen, Trinidad’s only bank is robbed at gunpoint.

Caleb guns down two of the robbers in the street, but the third escapes, a majority of the bank’s cash on his horse. The robbery leaves the bank near financial ruin, which could be fatal for both bank and Trinidad if the townsfolk demand their money. Caleb pledges to stay on as Trinidad’s sheriff until the final robber is caught, and the money is recovered.

The Big Showdown is a fine crime and Western hybrid. There is murder, fraud, and violence. The crime element features nicely placed and believable forensic crime scene interpretation by Caleb and the town’s doctor. There are gunfights, intrigue, and a lovable town drunk turned sober deputy. The prose is smooth as glass. The plot is interesting and while the master mind behind all the troubles in Trinidad is less than a mystery, how it plays out is satisfying and surprising.

New Mike Hammer Novel: THE GOLIATH BONE

I bumped into a new Mike Hammer novel in a local bookstore this past weekend. It is a collaborative effort between the late-Mickey Spillane and Max Allan Collins. Collins, or so I think, finished a manuscript left by Spillane at his death. This is the second Spillane novel Max Allan Collins has finished since his death—the first was Dead Street, a Hard Case Crime title that I haven’t read—and I don’t think it is the last. I’ve heard there are at least two more Hammer novels scheduled.

The two also collaborated on a recent short story—“There’s a Killer Loose!”—in the August issue of Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine. It was really pretty good. It had the flavor of a 1950s hardboiled story and a plot that could have been pulled from an old radio mystery. I really enjoyed it.

The description of The Goliath Bone:

The bestselling American mystery writer of all time brings back his world-famous PI Mike Hammer for his biggest—and most dangerous—case. In the midst of a Manhattan snowstorm, Hammer halts the violent robbery of a pair of college sweethearts who have stumbled onto a remarkable archaeological find in the Valley of Elah: the perfectly preserved femur of what may have been the biblical giant Goliath. Hammer postpones his marriage to his faithful girl Friday, Velda, to fight a foe deadlier than the mobsters and KGB agents of his past—Islamic terrorists and Israeli extremists bent upon recovering the relic for their own agendas.

A week before his death, Mickey Spillane entrusted a substantial portion of this manuscript and extensive notes to his frequent collaborator, Max Allan Collins, to complete. The result is a thriller as classic as Spillane’s own I, the Jury, as compelling as Collins’s Road to Perdition, and as contemporary as The Da Vinci Code.

P.S. Hopefully it's significantly better than The Da Vinci Code.

New Mickey Spillane Novel--Dead Street

Hard Case Crime has announced a new, never before published Mickey Spillane novel titled Dead Street. It will be released in November, 2007. Mickey died in July, 2006 and according to Hard Case Crime editor Charles Ardai he left one completed crime novel--Dead Street--and several strands of unfinished Mike Hammer novels. Rumor has it Max Allan Collins has been hired by Spillane's estate to finish the Mike Hammer novels.

Spillane was the bestselling author of the Twentieth century--yes children, he even out sold Stephen King--and he is best known for his hardboiled Mike Hammer novels, which were made into a myriad of films and televsion series'. None of them very good.

I have never been a huge fan of the Hammer novels--they are just a bit too hard boiled for my taste, but I have to admit I am excited for Dead Street to make it to my local bookstore. The Hard Case Crime website description is:

For 20 years, former NYPD cop Jack Stang has lived with the memory of his girlfriend’s death in an attempted abduction. But what if she weren’t actually dead? What if she somehow secretly survived—but lost her sight, and her memory, and everything else she had...except her enemies?

Cool, eh? At least the cover art is.

Click Here to visit the Hard Case publicity site.
Click Here to read The Guardian's obituary of Mickey Spillane.