Slice of P.I.: “Death of a Dastard”

(Part of a series celebrating fictional private eyes.)



Death of a Dastard, by Henry Kane (Signet, 1963), with a cover illustration by Jerry Allison. Here we have just one of more than 30 novels Kane produced starring “private richard” (his distinctive spin on “private dick”) Pete Chambers, a fashionable, man-about-metropolis New Yorker with a wolfish eye for women.

“Holocaust,” by Anthony McCall

Holocaust, by “Anthony McCall,” aka Henry Kane (Pocket, 1968). Published originally in hardcover in 1967, this appears to be one of only two novels Kane—the creator of swingin’ New York City private eye Peter Chambers—published under his McCall pseudonym. The other was Operation Delta.

Cover illustration by Harry Bennett.

Because I Needed a Henry Kane Fix …

Dead in Bed, by Henry Kane (Lancer, 1961). This was an entry in Kane’s series starring New York City “private richard” Pete Chambers. Cover illustration by Oscar Liebman.

(Not to be confused with this other novel by Day Keene.)

Bennett’s Beauties: “Snatch an Eye”

Part of a month-long celebration of Harry Bennett’s artistic skills.


Snatch an Eye, by Henry Kane (Permabooks, 1964). This is an entry in Kane’s long-running series starring Peter Chambers, a Manhattan-based “private richard” (yes, Kane persisted in using that clumsy reference as a substitute for “private dick”).

More Eye Candy from Kane

Earlier this week I gave big play on this page to the 1958 Avon Books edition of Fistful of Death, Henry Kane’s ninth novel to star swinging Manhattan private eye Peter Chambers, with a cover illustration by Raymond Johnson. But there’s another paperback version of the same work that I actually prefer. Shown below, it was released in 1965 by Signet, and the painting on its front was done by Ron Lesser.

Duped: “A Fistful of Death”

The latest installment in Killer Covers’ “haven’t we seen this front someplace before?” series. Previous entries are here.



Crime novelist Henry Kane (1908-1988) has always pissed me off. Just a wee bit. While the rest of the 20th-century fiction-writing world easily adopted terms such as “private eye” (inspired, presumably, by the Pinkerton’s National Detective Agency’s original logo, featuring an unblinking human eye above the slogan “We Never Sleep”), “private investigator” (aka P.I.), and “gumshoe” when referring to those myriad determined, frequently down-on-their luck, and sometimes intoxicated freelance sleuths assigned to solve imaginary mysteries and rescue comely dames in danger, Kane habitually referred to them as “private richards.” I assume this was intended as a witty twist on “private dick,” but it comes off as a silly affectation. Whether Kane was the sole detective-fictionist to employ this cognomen, I don’t know (he may simply have been the only one to not deliver it with a broad wink), but I’m always stopped cold when I stumble across the term in one of his stories, be it a Peter Chambers mystery or his 1960 TV tie-in novel, Peter Gunn. (It has been said--by no less than Lawrence Block--that Chambers was actually the inspiration for Blake Edwards’ jazz-loving shamus.)

The fashionable, swinging Mr. Chambers made his debut in 1947’s A Halo for Nobody, and managed to keep up his popular run (as well as his pursuit of curvaceous women) through dozens of short stories, a 1954 radio series titled Crime and Peter Chambers (starring Dane Clark), and at least 29 novels, including A Corpse for Christmas (1951), Too French and Too Deadly (1955), Death of a Flack (1961), and Nobody Loves a Loser (1963). “Chambers’ adventures are usually set in New York,” explains Prologue Books, which has re-released a number of them in print and e-book versions. “His secretary, Miranda Foxworth, is ‘built like an old-fashioned icebox but colder.’ Pete frequents Trennan’s Dark Morning Tavern, a local bar. Chambers characterizes himself as, ‘A wiseguy private eye. Talks hard with the tough guys, purrs with the ladies. All the girls fall for him. You know, like what you read about.’ Needless to say, one of Chambers’ distinguishing traits is his sense of humor and love for word play. … In 1969, with the sexual revolution beginning and censorship regulations loosening, Peter Chambers joined right in, and became one of the first X-rated private eyes. These novels were published by Lancer books, a soft-core publishing house, and began with Don’t Call Me Madame (1969). Later titles include The Shack Job (1969), The Glow Job (1971), and The Tail Job (1971).”

Fistful of Death was the ninth entry in Kane’s Chambers series. I don’t own a copy, but Prologue offers this brief plot synopsis:

The proposition sounded like a pushover. All Peter Chambers had to do was find out where a teen-aged chorine had been for the past month and why. And for that information the girl's father, a prosperous banker, would pay Chambers a cool thousand dollars. It was a quick way to earn some easy money. So Chambers thought … until he found out that the fistful of cash carried a little something extra along with it--A FISTFUL OF DEATH.

The cover shown at the top of this post was taken from the apparently original, 1958 Avon Books version of Fistful of Death. It features an illustration by Raymond Johnson, whose artwork I have periodically showcased in Killer Covers, but about whom I can find little background information on the Web. (If anyone out there knows more about his life or career, please drop me a line).

That same Johnson painting was employed--only in reverse--a year later by UK publisher Panther Books on its paperback edition of The Deadly Miss Ashley, a novel that had first been brought out by Doubleday & Company in 1950. When it debuted, The Deadly Miss Ashley carried the byline of Frederick C. Davis (1902-1977), a pulp writer who, being quite prolific, also wrote as “Murdo Coombs,” “Curtis Steele,” and “Stephen Ransome.” Panther’s version of the novel, displayed on the right, carries the Ransome pseudonym.

The Deadly Miss Ashley was the opening entry in Davis/Ransome’s series starring Luke Speare, the brains behind the New York City-based Cole Detective Agency, and his boss, Schyler Cole. In this one, notes the blog Pulp International, “Miss Ashley is actually a missing person who Cole and Speare need to locate.” The pair went on to lead five more novels, among them Another Morgue Heard From (1954). Not bad for a couple of fly-by-the-seat-of-their-britches private eyes. Or should I say, private richards?

Two-fer Tuesdays: Baby Got Back

A twice-monthly pairing of book covers that just seem to go together. Click on either of these images to open up an enlargement.



Sometimes, no matter how hard I try (and I’m a pretty diligent Web sleuth), I simply cannot figure out who to credit for creating a particular vintage book jacket. Sadly, that’s the case with both of this week’s picks. On the left we have the front from the 1958 paperback edition of The Young Who Sin, the debut novel by John Haase (1923-2006), a German-born dentist, travel writer, and fictionist whose parents--wary of the Nazi buildup prior to the outbreak of World War II hostilities--had fled with him to California. Haase would go on, in 1966, to publish Me and the Arch Kook Petulia, a “charming novel” that was adapted in 1968 into the motion-picture Petulia, starring Julie Christie and George C. Scott. The Young Who Sin never enjoyed such Hollywood attenion. It told the story of Al Barnaby, who, in the early 1950s, ran away from his family’s comfortable digs in San Francisco and landed in the Mexican border town of Tijuana. There he encountered “floozies, punks, addicts, and weekend Romeos,” and--according to a write-up on the AbeBooks site--became most familiar with four people in particular:

FIFI, who danced for two-bit jokers along Strip-tease Row; MARIA, a young beginner in what’s called the world’s oldest profession; CONSUELA, who had forgotten there was such a thing as love above a price; HERMAN, who lived high and cruelly, off the low.

But Al was looking for more than a cheap thrill, and from these lost souls he learned that compassion and human understanding can redeem even the most abandoned of God’s sinners.

Above and on the right, meanwhile, you’ll see the cover from the 1957 Avon paperback original, Death on the Double, one of several short-story collections by Henry Kane (1908-1988??). Kane’s reputation derived principally from his creation of Peter Chambers, a Manhattan private eye who may have inspired the TV series character Peter Gunn. Chambers had his own success, leaping from the pages of novels into a short-lived NBC radio series, Crime and Peter Chambers, that starred Dane Clark and debuted in 1954 (and can be heard here). Death on the Double features at least three of Chambers’ investigations.

Finally, if anyone out there knows who illustrated this pair of covers, please don’t hesitate to drop that information into the Comments section below. We can all stand to learn something.