“You’re the second guy I’ve met within hours who seems to think a gat in the hand means a world by the tail.” – Phillip Marlowe in Raymond Chandler’s The Big Sleep

(Gat — Prohibition Era term for a gun. Shortened version of Gatling Gun)

So, as I type this, I am 99% moved from my apartment of the past six years, into the small house I bought a couple weeks ago (well, along with the bank…), which I happily call my writer’s bungalow. It has a small loft. I put in my desk (a cafeteria table) and as many bookshelves as I could fit in it. This is truly my happy place.

I started packing up my books in May. I’ve been crazy stressed between house hunting, house closing, and work. And packing. And I have felt oddly bereft, with my books in boxes. Unanchored. For someone who went through a divorce and moved out of his house in 2020 (like that wasn’t a hard enough year by itself!), this was unsettling. I couldn’t look over and see shelves of books. I couldn’t grab one for a Black Gate post.

I have over 2,000 physical books, and I moved all of them with my car, in about 55-60 boxes – yeah, that took a LOT of trips! As you can see by the pic, I’m filling up my sadly outnumbered bookcases, gradually. Things like installing a washer and dryer, finding my socket set (I swear, that thing vanished), and an inconveniently timed out-of-town work trip, have taken precedence.

But my new house is slowly filling with my fiction and non-fiction collections. And THAT is helping me feel settled again. But in addition to the loft, there’s another terrific writing aspect to my bungalow. A (Black) Gat in the Hand fans (and long-time FB followers) may remember my former house had a terrific back deck, which led to Back Deck Pulp.

My apartment had a nice little concrete slab, facing a lot of trees, and thus was born the infrequent Back Porch Pulp.

Welcome, Front Porch Pulp! I’ve got a nice little railed front porch, facing due east. I catch the sunrise over an open field. That does mean it feels the sun a chunk of the day, but I’ll figure it out. And it does shave some shade. It absolutely will make for nice reading sessions in the evenings. I’m really excited to read outside again.

And who do we have for our very first Front Porch Pulp post? It’s Frank Kane: not a familiar name these days. Kane’s first mystery story was his third to find print, in 1944, at the age of 32. It featured hardboiled PI Johnny Liddell. Kane would appear in about fifty short stories, and over two dozen novels. Kane was still writing Liddell when he died of a heart attack at only age 56.

The prolific Kane also wrote for radio (including Casey, Crime Photographer), and TV, where he scripted two dozen of Darren McGavin’s Mike Hammer shows.

I think I’ve mentioned that there are a TON of Pulp ebooks through Prologue Crime. And a bunch are part of Kindle Unlimited. That’s where I first ran across Kane’s name, though there are ebooks from other publishers out there. And several are just 99 cents!

Johnny Come Lately is my first Liddell book. He’s an honest PI, pretty straightforward, though with some sarcasm on call, with an eye for the ladies. A female client with curves seems to have a pretty good chance to secure his services. He has a no-nonsense secretary who keeps the office running and bullies him into doing the administrative stuff. She seems immune to his flirting.

Liddell has no problem giving someone the Mike Hammer treatment. Especially if they shoot first.

I’ve got another book, which I’ll read after this one, and see how Liddell feels after two adventures. I’m a fan of William Campbell Gault’s nice-guy PI, Brock Callahan. Liddell isn’t the same level of nice, but he also has that unspectacular vibe. And nothing wrong with that. I like this book so far, and

I think it’s gonna work for me. But I want to get a better handle on Liddell.

So, Front Porch Pulp will be making some Summer appearances. And more in the Fall. And maybe now that I have a true writer’s room, I’ll make some progress on completing some more stories. It’s been awhile since I finished my last Sherlock Holmes ones. And I’m feeling a little hardboiled.

Prior Entries:
Back Porch Pulp #1
Back Porch Pulp #2
Back Deck Pulp #1
Back Deck Pulp #2
Back Deck Pulp #3
Back Deck Pulp #4
Back Deck Pulp #5
Back Deck Pulp #6
Back Deck Pulp Returns!

 

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Bob Byrne’s ‘A (Black) Gat in the Hand’ made its Black Gate debut in 2018 and has returned every Summer since.

His ‘The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes’ column ran every Monday morning at Black Gate from March, 2014 through March, 2017. And he irregularly posts on Rex Stout’s gargantuan detective in ‘Nero Wolfe’s Brownstone.’ He is a member of the Praed Street Irregulars, and founded www.SolarPons.com (the only website dedicated to the ‘Sherlock Holmes of Praed Street’).

He organized Black Gate’s award-nominated ‘Discovering Robert E. Howard’ series, as well as the award-winning ‘Hither Came Conan’ series. Which is now part of THE Definitive guide to Conan. He also organized 2023’s ‘Talking Tolkien.’

He has contributed stories to The MX Book of New Sherlock Holmes Stories — Parts III, IV, V, VI, XXI, and XXXIII.

He has written introductions for Steeger Books, and appeared in several magazines, including Black Mask, Sherlock Holmes Mystery Magazine, The Strand Magazine, and Sherlock Magazine.

You can definitely ‘experience the Bobness’ at Jason Waltz’s ’24? in 42′ podcast.