Shayne was created by Davis Dresser and first appeared in the
1939 novel
_Dividend on Death_, published under the pseudonym Brett
Halliday. Dresser
wrote fifty Shayne novels (with a little help from
ghostwriters such as
Ryerson Johnson), all published first in hardback by Henry
Holt, Dodd Mead,
and finally Torquil Books, Dresser's own imprint which was
distributed by
Dodd Mead. Twenty-seven more Shayne novels were written by
Robert Terrall
and published as paperback originals by Dell, still under the
pseudonym
Brett Halliday.
Mike Shayne Mystery Magazine was started in 1956 by Leo
Margulies, a
veteran editor from the pulp era. Margulies licensed the
character of Mike
Shayne but hired other writers to produce the Shayne stories
in the
magazine. The first editor of the magazine was Sam Merwin
Jr., who also
wrote many of the Shayne stories. Others who contributed
Shayne stories as
Brett Halliday include Dennis Lynds (the most prolific, with
approximately
80 stories), Michael Avallone, Richard Deming, Robert Turner,
Robert
Arthur, Frank Belknap Long, Bill Pronzini and Jeff Wallman,
Edward Y.
Breese, Peter Germano, Hal Blythe and Charlie Sweet, and
yours truly, who
did either 37 or 38 of them (I never can remember which). No
doubt other
writers did some here and there, too. The final issue of the
magazine was
August '85. It ran almost thirty years and there were over
300 Mike Shayne
stories published in it, ranging from 7500 word short stories
to 20,000
word novellas (the most common length). In addition, the
magazine
published many, many short stories by hard-boiled authors,
especially in
the Sixties: Dennis Lynds, as Michael Collins, with the
Slot-Machine Kelly
stories, the forerunners of the Dan Fortune novels; Richard
S. Prather with
Shell Scott stories; Frank Kane with Johnny Liddell stories;
Henry Kane
with Peter Chambers stories, etc. Today these issues are
difficult to find
but worth looking for. MSMM was a good magazine, probably not
the equal of
Manhunt at its height, but it hung in there for a lot
longer.
Best,
James Reasoner
----------
> From: Laurent Lehmann
<llehmann@club-internet.fr>
> To: rara-avis@icomm.ca
> Subject: Re: RARA-AVIS: Mike Shayne (was Last Week's
Reading)
> Date: Saturday, October 11, 1997 4:54 PM
>
> On 1 Oct 97 at 22:15, James & Livia Reasoner
wrote:
>
> > One point from the first half of the book that
I'd argue with: in his
> > introduction to "Human Interest Stuff", Bill
Pronzini quotes Art Scott
as
> > saying, "Mike Shayne is the Generic Private
Eye." Well, Shayne may
have
> > ended up that way, but he certainly didn't start
out like that.
>
> I've only read a half-dozen Mike Shaynes, and that
was long ago, in an
> abbreviated French version, but I'd like to know more
about Mike Shayne
> and Mike Shayne Mystery Magazine : How long did the
magazine run, who
were
> the main contributors, who wrote the Mike Shayne
stories,...
>
> Laurent
> ____
> "When you're slapped, you'll take and like
it"
> Humphrey Bogart in The Maltese Falcon,
> from Hardboiled by P. Thompson & S.
Usukawa.
> #
> # To unsubscribe, say "unsubscribe rara-avis" to
majordomo@icomm.ca.
> # The web pages for the list are at http://www.vex.net/~buff/rara-avis/.
#
# To unsubscribe, say "unsubscribe rara-avis" to
majordomo@icomm.ca.
# The web pages for the list are at http://www.vex.net/~buff/rara-avis/.