The Feel-Good Noir Collection of the Summer

I'm calling it now.

Today I received an advance copy of Stark House Press's latest Harry Whittington collection, which includes three insanely rare short novels: To Find Cora, Like Mink Like Murder and Body and Passion. Whittington, of course, was the King of the Paperback during the 1950s and the author of the paperback suspense classics Web of Murder, The Devil Wears Wings and A Moment to Prey. All three were reprinted by Black Lizard in the late 1980s; all three are definitely worth hunting down and savoring. (This Harry Whittington, it's worth noting, was not the dude Dick Cheney shot in the face.)

Now I haven't read a single word of these short novels—I only received this ARC today—but the introduction alone is worth the price of the book. In it, mystery expert David Laurence Wilson talks about how he tracked down these rare finds, and it's like a pulp-nerd detective story. Sam Spade had his Maltese Falcon; Wilson has his "39 Unknowns"—namely, the 39 novels Whittington wrote under house names starting in 1960. Each were required to be 60,000 words long, and Whittington later wrote that he cranked out 39 of these suckers, month after month. Yet, he never revealed their titles. Wilson writes that it was "the beginning of a literary legend."

I won't ruin the surprise for you, but you'll be amazed how many of these Wilson pins down. Wilson's my new hero. And the three short Whittington novels, one of which has never been available in English? I consider them a bonus.

The new collection will be available this coming July. I'd pre-order this one from Stark House directly, or through your favorite indie mystery shop.