Shady Lady, by Cleve F. Adams (Ace, 1955). Originally published as Too Fair to Die, one of two works paired in a cheap, 1951 Two Complete Detective Books edition with Fredric Brown’s Compliments of a Fiend, Shady Lady was expanded, retitled, and repackaged as an Ace Double Novel opposite Harry Whittington’s One Got Away. It marked the sixth and final outing for Adams’ Rex McBride, a controversial Los Angeles dick described by one critic as “a racist, a fascist, and a hypocrite, but a tender ballad brings tears to his eyes. In one word, he’s an oaf, deliberately drawn by Adams so as to pull the rug out from under [Raymond] Chandler’s romantic image of the P.I. as a contemporary knight.” Cover artwork by Harry Barton.
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