Ed Lacy's 1959 Zenith Books novel BLONDE BAIT has a great
opening: our narrator, charter boat skipper Mickey Whalen, finds a beautiful
blonde on a deserted island in the Florida Keys, alone except for a gun and a
suitcase full of cash. If you can resist the temptation to find out what
happens from there, you're made of stronger stuff than I am.
For a while it looks like Mickey has had a real stroke of
luck, but if you've read many of these novels you know it's not going to last.
Sure enough, trouble from the past crops up to plague our hero and the
beautiful and mysterious Rose, and Mickey has to turn detective to sort
everything out and try to come up with a happy ending for the two of them.
Wherever you think this book is going, though, there's a
really good chance that where it winds up is a whole other place. And that's
why, even though I'm doing this as a Forgotten Books post, I can give BLONDE
BAIT only a qualified recommendation. The whole explanation for what's behind
the plot just doesn't ring true to me, and Lacy's thinly-disguised political
rants don't help matters. A good ending might excuse all of this, but we don't
get that, either.
What makes BLONDE BAIT worth reading is the first half,
where Lacy fills in the narrator's back-story with a freewheeling mix of
flashbacks that work very well and are a nice change of pace from the usual
straight-ahead narrative drive of hardboiled crime novels. Mickey Whalen is a
likable protagonist, too, and you can't help but root for him. Like some of
Orrie Hitt's protagonists, even when he thinks he's being a heel, he's a pretty
decent guy at heart and wants to do the right thing if he can just figure out
what it is. And even though the book falls apart in the second half, you still
have to sort of admire Lacy for the chances he takes, whether they work or not.
So there's my mixed opinion of BLONDE BAIT. Don't rush out
to look for a copy, but if you come across one for a reasonable price, it's
probably worth picking up. If nothing else, it's a Zenith Book, and you don't
see very many of those these days.
4 comments:
A lot of the covers for those 50s paperback originals promised a lot more than the novelist ever delivered. hubba hubba!
I've read other books by Ed Lacy and enjoyed them. I haven't read this one. Too bad the second half goes off in that direction. A little bit the political asides goes a long ways. But I'm curious about the good things you explain about in the first half. Thanks, James. I enjoyed your review.
Ed Lynskey
This and pretty much all of Lacy's other books apparently did not have their copyright renewed and are available on Munseys.com.
Ed Lacey is pretty good. I recommend The Best that Ever Did it (also known as Visa To Death)
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