RARA-AVIS: Prather and the Kanes

Bill Crider (abc@wt.net)
Sun, 14 Feb 1999 18:54:23 -0600 (CST) Richard Prather's early books are a bit like Spillane, but later on he
blossomed into one of the truly zany writers of private-eye fiction. My
favorite, though, is a book he did with Stephen Marlowe, DOUBLE IN TROUBLE,
told in alternating chapters by Chester Drum and Shell Scott.

Frank Kane always struck me as a workmanlike tough-guy writer, quite a bit
different from Henry Kane, whose books have a lighter tone. H. Kane is an
interesting case. He started out in hardback, with Dell reprinting his
books. Then he went to paperback originals and his p.i., Peter Chambers
showed up in books from just about every publishing house around. At the
end of his career, he wound up working for Lancer, still writing about
Chambers, even though the books were supposedly "X-rated" and had titles
like THE SCHACK JOB.

Bill Crider

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