Golden hooliganism

Thomas Blanchard Dewey was an American author of hardboiled crime novels He created two series of novels the first one features Mac a private investigator from Chicago the second features Pete Schofield. Golden hooliganism definition A Pete Schofield Mystery by Thomas B Dewey Dell First Edition B207 First Printing October 1961 Thirty five cents cover price Cover art by Barye Phillips Golden HooliganThis is another mid century pulp detective book I picked up almost at random It was better than Death Comes Early but that s a pretty low bar The plot is serviceable but unspectacular Short mindless forgettable entertainment vaguely better than watching a movie. Golden hooliganism All of this kind of noir detective fiction has one key problem how do you explain not just going to the police Here a suburban beauty finds a dead body in her garage She convinces a drunk private eye to help her out with disposing it andhe agrees One of the main highlights of reading these old books is to marvel at how much the world and language has changed in a relatively short period of time There is unsurprisingly tons of racism sexism and homophobia There s an extended sequence where his wife walks in on him in bed with a naked girl and the rest of the book he gaslights her wait for Jeannie to come to her senses or If you will start behaving like a sensible girl and doesn t even really try to explain Nothing happened but stillhe didn t exactly tell the girl to put on clothes or get out of his bed or get out of his hotel room But what is most noticeable is the language which sometimes feels like it should come with a translation guide And this is from an America not too long ago Not too much she said Thirty or forty martinis and a blonde who forgot to zip up her shirtwaist What is a shirtwaist What does it mean that it isn t zipped up she carried one of those shapeless reticules now known as a tote bag How quaint that tote bagged needed to put in quotes because it was newfangled slang Was the Jaguar locked No I never lock it I see So anybody at all could come along and make use of the car without any trouble I guess so But nobody ever has Imagine not locking the door on your fancy sports carI m well the most polite term for it I m an adventuress That s a little old fashioned but I m sure you know what I mean. Golden hooliganish Actually I had no idea what she meant From later context it appears to mean she was some kind of high end prostitute or escort I wonder what things we take for granted today will be equally opaque to future readers English In Dewey s Pete Schofield series he takes a classic detective story and combines with some lighthearted banter between Pete and his red haired fiery wife Jeannie and Dewey makes it work. Golden hoogendorn holly The Golden Hooligan 1961 is one of the best of the series and opens with Schofield awakening from a drunken stupor as his wife harangues him about spending all evening at the party with a blonde who was practically topless The dialogue works well and serves to rope the reader in to a tale that starts in an odd fashion. Golden hoogendorn The story involves dead bullfighters golden haired blondes in giant hats and almost invisible bikinis body snatchers knife wielding tough guys a poet in a bathtub beatniks living in shacks and a don ready to return to California to reclaim his family landholdings. Golden hoogendorn holly This is a terrific book that is easy to read and a great introduction to the Schofield series English