“Them is de mens.” ~ Coffin Ed Johnson and Grave Digger Jones

After Hammett, Chandler, and Spillane along came Chester Himes. Himes deserves to be listed with these three masters of hard-boiled mysteries. My first reaction after reading Himes first book featuring his two Harlem detectives Coffin Ed and Grave Digger, was – “What could I give up to be able to write like this?”

Himes was born, in 1909, into an educated family and showed academic flair. His brother Joseph was blinded in a high school experiment and was refused treatment in an all-white hospital. The family moved. Grief over his brother and anger at his taste of racism, combined with difficulties between his parents and Chester began a downward slide into drugs and sex. He enrolled in Ohio State University, but withdrew after leading a group of ‘proper young black’ students from a frat party to a slum brothel. At 19, he committed armed robbery and was sentenced to 20-25 years. He began writing in prison. Released after 8 years, he moved to California where he continued to write. Feeling his novels weren’t appreciated he moved to Paris, France. It was here, that the French publisher of noir fiction, Marcel Duhamel, urged him to write detective stories.

Himes books are not for everyone. If you have a hard time with violence, swearing, and foul language these books are not for you. If you ever wanted a job working for the political correctness police, these books are not for you. Johnson and Jones are two black cops in 1950s Harlem, where PC wasn’t the flavor of the day. If you are sensitive about how women, of any color are portrayed, these books are not for you. “Her breast stuck out from a turtleneck blue jersey silk pullover, as though taking aim at any man in front of her.” – All Shot Up

His books are for people who care about books that are lyrical, funny, brutal, and visceral. Books with unique characters that are real and dialogue that rings true. His Harlem is as real as it gets. He makes no apologies for the shortcomings of his characters. In fact, they are drawn for us so completely we understand who they are and why they are the way they are, and we care about them. If asked to describe Jones and Johnson I would say they are big, black, Coffin Ed has a scarred face, and they both carry big guns. The secondary characters are the ones that stay with you even after you’ve put the book down.

I love the absurd situations. Most of the books begin with two or three very absurd situations, seemingly unrelated, and it isn’t until you are well into the book that you learn why they are related. Someone criticized his books for this reason. His answer? “Realism and absurdity are so similar in the lives of American blacks one cannot tell the difference.” (1976)

A Rage in Harlem is the first book in Himes’ Harlem series. This is where it all begins. If you want an exceptional experience, get the audio version with Samuel L. Jackson. Coffin Ed and Grave Digger don’t make an appearance until Chapter 9, when they enter the police station and find chaos.

“A young white cop had arrested a middle-aged drunken colored woman for prostitution. The big rough brown-skinned man dressed in overall and a leather jacket picked up with her claimed she was his mother and he was just walking her home.

‘Gettin’ so a woman can’t even walk down the street with her own natural-born son,’ the woman complained.

‘Shut up, can’t you?’ the cop said irritably.

‘Don’t you tell my mama to shut up,’ the man said.

‘If this whore’s your mama, I’m Santa Claus,’ the cop said.

‘Don’t you call me no whore,’ the woman said, and slammed the cop in the face with her pocketbook.

The cop struck back instinctively and knocked the woman down. The colored man hit the cop above the ear and knocked him down. Another cop let go his own prisoner and slapped the man about the head. The man staggered head-forward into another cop, who slapped him again. In the excitement someone stepped on the woman and she began screaming.

‘Help! Help! They’s tramplin’ me!’

‘They’s killin’ a colored-woman!’ another prisoner yelled.

Everybody started fighting.

The desk sergeant looked down from the sanctuary of his desk and said in a bored voice, ‘Jesus Christ.’

At that moment Coffin Ed and Grave Digger entered with their two prisoners.

‘Straighten up!’ Grave Digger shouted in a stentorian voice.

‘Count off!’ Coffin Ed yelled.

Both of them drew their pistols at the same time and put a fusillade into the ceiling, which was already filled with holes they’d shot into it before.

The sudden shooting in the jammed room scared hell out of prisoners and cops alike. Everybody froze.”

The Real Cool Killers is the second book. A man is shot. The suspect is seen standing over the body with a gun. He drops the gun and runs off. The problem? The gun is loaded with blanks.

“The white manager stood on top of the bar and shouted, “Please remain seated, folks. Everybody, go back to his seat, and pay his bill. The police have been called and everything will be taken care of.

As though he’d fired a starting gun, there was a race for the door.”

The Crazy Kill is the third book. The Reverend Short is attending a wake. Standing at a window, he witnesses a robbery in the A& P store across the street. Leaning out, to watch the police and the store manager chase after the thief, he falls out of the window into a basket of bread loves. He returns to the wake but a gathering crowd discovers another body amongst the bread. Like an Agatha Christie mystery, almost all those attending the wake had reason to kill the man in the bread. It’s up to our two detectives to solve the case.

The Big Gold Dream, the fourth book, is one of the two weakest in the series. Our two detectives don’t make an appearance until the book is almost over.

All Shot Up, the next in the series, fights with A Rage in Harlem and Cotton Comes to Harlem as the best of the series. It really is a three-way tie. In this one, a car hits an old woman crossing the street. She gets up and takes a few steps before a cop car runs over her. The problem? The woman wasn’t a woman, and the cops weren’t cops.

The Heat’s On is the other book considered a weak entry. It certainly wasn’t my cup of tea as the story involves killing animals. I can’t bring myself to recommend it to anyone, but some might not be bothered by it. The book’s good point is that it shows the deep bond between the two detectives. Grave Digger is shot and in a coma at the hospital. Coffin Ed believes Grave Digger died and Ed is out for vengeance.

Cotton Comes to Harlem is the next to the last of the series. Deke O’Hara is just out of prison and already he’s working a con. He’s selling good church folk $1000 shares in his Back To Africa project. Our two detectives deal out their own brand of justice in order for the folks to get their money back. I won’t tell you how cotton figures into the story except to say that a very special bale becomes a stage prop for one Billie, doing a very seductive and suggestive dance.

A Blind Man with a Pistol is where it all ends. This is the masterpiece of the series. Don’t start reading Himes with this book. It is the last and one needs to read it last. By the time you reach A Blind Man with a Pistol, you know Himes’ two detectives. You know they like to solve their cases and render some justice. They don’t mind violence, as long as they are administering it for a reason. This book is different from the rest. It takes place during one night and one day, in the heat of summer, as the Harlem Race Riots begin. Tasked with finding out who killed a white man, they are also trying to find those responsible for the riots.

“Blink once, you’re robbed,’ Coffin Ed advised the white man slumming in Harlem. ‘Blink twice and you’re dead,’ Grave Digger added dryly.”

Many readers find this episode disjointed and chaotic. Unlike most mysteries, our two detectives don’t solve their cases. The book is a poignant story of the chaotic nature of violence; and how impossible it can be to stop it. At times, the book doesn’t appear to make sense; because violence doesn’t make sense. The ending, however, does make sense because violence is random, rather like a blind man with a pistol. The series may have ended with this because Himes felt he had nothing left to say.

Another thing I love about these books. Chester Himes packs character, conflict, action, violence, humor and fantastic plots into a mere 150 pages more effectively than most present days writers put into 300 pages. Every sentence is not short. I went back to count and in Cotton, the sentence I picked was 34 words. And the reader never stumbles.  Oh–to write like Himes!

I’m Celebrating!

One Bad Day After Another is one of five Finalists for the Daphne Award for unpublished mainstream mystery!

I never imagined that one day I would write a book! Honest. I’m not someone who will say “I knew I wanted to write since I was in first grade.” Not even close. I’ve always enjoyed reading and speaking. But where authors got the idea for a story I couldn’t imagine. (Just like I can’t imagine how a composer ‘hears’ music.)

But one summer afternoon I was sitting in the backyard and the opening scene of One Bad Day After Another came, full blown, into my head. This year I entered the manuscript in the Daphne writing competition It was quite a shock when I got the phone call saying the book was a FINALIST! (In fact, for an entire day I expected the phone would ring and they would say they’d called the wrong person by mistake – sorry!)

But that didn’t happen…and I am off in July to attend the Awards presentation in Denver.

One Bad Day After Another introduces Ottawa, Canada, female private eye Baker Somerset. She’s a feisty red-head with freckles and a hard-boiled attitude. Please check her out at her website http://www.bakersomerset.com

The Daphne du Maurier Award is presented by the Romance Writers of America Mystery/Suspence Chapter Kiss of Death. http://www.rwakissofdeath.org/daphne

 

Biggers & Chan

A mystery that may never be solved to my satisfaction is this—why does Hollywood seem determined to take a wonderful book and rewrite it? And, seldom for the better. And then, to add insult to injury, the public welcomes the poorer version with such acclaim that the original is lost to remain hidden on a dusty shelf in a used book store.

Such is the tale of that illustrious detective Charlie Chan of the Honolulu Police, brought to life by Earl Derr Biggers.

Biggers was born in 1884 in Ohio, graduated from Harvard in 1907. He worked as a journalist following graduation and was the drama critic for the Boston Traveler. His reviews were too blunt (a lesson for all who review) and he was fired in 1912. The following year he wrote Seven Keys for Baldpate which was immediately successful.  Seven different films were made of the book over the years, plus two others which told the same story but were given different titles.

Other books followed and then he decided to write a mystery.  The House Without a Key was serialized in the Saturday Evening Post beginning January 24, 1924. His second Charlie Chan book was bought by the Post for $25,000. In total he wrote only six Charlie Chan novels, but thanks to Hollywood writers Charlie has appeared in over four dozen movies.  He has also appeared in numerous pastiches, comic books and even a board game. Biggers stated on the occasion of the twenty-fifth anniversary of his graduation from Harvard University in 1932, “I am quite sure that I never intended to travel the road of the mystery writer.  Nor did I deliberately choose to have in the seat at my side, his life forever entangled with mine, a bland and moon-faced Chinese.  Yet here I am, and with me Charlie Chan.  Thank heaven he is amiable, philosophical–a good companion.  For I know now that he and I must travel the rest of the journey together.” Biggers died a year later of a heart attack. He was 48.

Thoughts

With the exception of science fiction, novels try to portray the attitudes and culture of the time they were written, or the time they portray. But our perception of how that time is portrayed evolves with time as well. When Biggers set out to write the Chan mysteries, it was the time of the “Yellow Peril” where Chinese were portrayed as a danger to the Western world. He developed a Chinese detective whose characteristics were intelligence, honor, and heroism. Plus, he was a loving family man. (In the first book Charlie has nine children, eventually he has a total of eleven. His Number One Son does not participate in the cases as portrayed in the movies and television series.) As a result the Chan books were widely popular in China, where people were pleased to see a Chinese character portrayed in such a positive light. But the wheel of political correctness continued to turn to the other extreme and much later people judged Chan harshly, feeling his portrayal was condescending. (You just can’t please everyone.)

In the books Charlie speaks English well, only using a Pidgin English when “undercover” such as in The Chinese Parrot.  He comments to his companion, “All my life,” he complained, “I study to speak fine English words. Now I must strangle all such in my throat, lest suspicion rouse up. Not a happy situation for me.” When he is accused by a young woman of having a “do-nothing” “Confucius attitude” he stands up for himself. In fact, none of his wise comments are ever attributed, in the books, to Confucius as is the case in the movies.

The relationship between the Chinese and Japanese, which at this time was not cordial, is also alluded to (rather bluntly) in The House Without a Key. “The proprietor, a suave little Jap, came gliding. He bowed from the waist. “Is it that you serve here insanitary food?’ inquired Chan. ‘Please deign to state your complaint,’ said the Jap. ‘This piece of pie are covered with finger marks,’ rebuked Chan. ‘The sight are most disgusting. Kindly remove it and bring me a more hygienic sector.’ The Jap picked up the offending pastry and carried it away. ‘Japanese,’ remarked Chan, spreading his hands in an eloquent gesture.”

Charlie also deals with that very British idea that the upper class would never stoop to do something horrific. “But the man’s a gentleman.’ John Quincy cried. ‘A captain in the British Admiralty. What you suggest is impossible.’ Chan shook his head. ‘Impossible in Rear Bay at Boston,’ he said, ‘but here at moonly crossroads of Pacific, not so much so. Twenty-five years of my life are consumed in Hawaii, and I have many times been witness when the impossible roused itself and occurred.’”

The Chan Stories

The Chan mysteries are such a delightful respite from the immediacy and in-your-face drama of the modern mystery where the opening paragraph has to grab you by the throat and haul you into the book with ferociousness. They roll with the waves of the Pacific lapping on the shore. The beginning of the first books shows us Hawaii. “It was the hour at which she liked Waikiki best, the hour just preceding dinner and the quick tropic darkness. The shadows cast by the tall coco-nut palms lengthened and deepened; the light of the falling sun flamed on Diamond Head and tinted with gold the rollers sweeping in from the coral reef. A few late swimmers, reluctant to depart, dotted those waters whose touch is like the caress of a lover.”

Not all the books take place in Hawaii, however. Charlie comes to the mainland in The Chinese Parrot, Behind That Curtain, and Scotland Yard in England has the first twelve chapters of Charlie Chan Carries On.

In fact, in the first book we learn how these stories will move along. John Quincy speaks to a fellow mainlander who has been on the island for some time. ‘”I don’t see how anyone can work in this climate,’ John Quincy said. ‘Oh, well, we take it easy…Every now and then some go-getter from the States comes out here and tries to hustle us.’ He laughed. ‘He dies of disgust and we bury him in a leisurely way. Been down to breakfast?”  In sharp contrast to our present day mysteries the body may not show up for several chapters.

Charlie’s method of detection relies only a little on the scientific. He does believe in fingerprints even though he says, “Fingerprints and other mechanics good in books, in real life not so much so. My experience tells me to think deep about human people. Human passions. Back of murder what always? Hate, revenge, need to make silent the slain one. Greed for money, maybe. Study human people at all times.”

Another noticeable difference in the Cham mysteries from today’s crime fiction is that although Charlie is most assuredly the star, he mostly appears as a background character. Charlie is the one who patiently waits for the clues, which always come to him, and who solves the case. Every character in each story is completely fashioned out of whole cloth, be he the steward on a ship or a rich business man.

I recommend taking the time to read the six Chan novels. I also firmly believe that you will become so enamored of Biggers writing that you’ll move on to his non-Chan books, a couple of them have tremendously wonderful twists at the end.

The Chan books in order are: The House Without a Key, The Chinese Parrot, Behind That Curtain, The Black Camel, Charlie Chan Carries On and The Keeper of the Keys, the only Chan book not to become a movie. It was, however a stage play. Give these non-Chan books a try: The Agony Column in which a young man courts a young lady through the personals (known as the agony column) and tells a tale of murder. This is one with a great twist. The Ebony Stick which is a story of a con job gone wrong, then right, then wrong, and finally with a twist, right. It involves love, of course. “…they’re to be married in Florence. Ain’t that a sissy name for a town?” Love Insurance which is a comedy of errors, false identities, stolen jewels love and marriage. Fifty Candles, and my least favorite, but the one that started it all – Seven Keys to Baldpate.