June 23, 2026 – SMB Noir

January 1921 issue ~ cover art by Archie Gunn

January 1921 issue

cover art by Archie Gunn

~ John Baer, “The Murder of An Te-Hai”, ‘NYC’s Chinatown’, 1^st of 24 stories in BM

~ Frank Blighton, “An Automatic Alibi”, ‘bank fraud; 1^st-person narrator’, 2^nd of 2 stories in BM

~ Hamilton Craigie, “The Pendulum of Fate”, 5^th of 7 solo stories in BM

~ Eric A. Darling, “The Malachite Jar”, 4^th of 5 stories in BM

~ Stephen H. Edwards, “Detective Alias Thief”, ‘con men outwit banker, et al., in a small Montana town’, author’s only appearance in BM

~ Clinton [aka Charles] Harcourt, “The White Face at the Cellar Window”, 4tf of 6 stories in BM

~ James Edward Hungerford, “By Fast Freight”, embezzlement in and around San Francisco, author’s sole appearance in BM

~ Julian Kilman, “Playing a Hunch”, ‘Dave Lacey, just out of prison’, 4th of 6 stories in BM

~ J.C. Kofoed, “The Puzzling Affair in the Rue Tilsit”, ‘Complete Novelette; fired NYC cop murdered in Paris’, 6^th of 9 stories in BM

~ C.S. Montanye (Carleton Stevens), “The Plan That Was Outlined by Monahan”, ‘young dip, yegg, & wire man’, 7th of 29 stories in BM

~ Harold Ward, “While the Blizzard Raged”, ‘people marooned with a murderer, 1^st-person narrator’, 10th of 29 stories under this name in BM [14th of 46 stories in BM under three different names – Ward Sterling and H.W. Starr]

©Seattle Mystery Bookshop

January 1935 issue ~ cover art by Fred Craft

January 1935 issue

cover art by Fred Craft

~ Raymond Chandler, “Killer in the Rain”, unnamed LA PI, 1^st person, first book appearance in the anthology Killer in the Rain (Hammish Hamilton, UK hardcover, 3/26/64, US edition by Houghton Mifflin, 1964), various paperback editions, reprinted in The Black Lizard Big Book of Pulps (Vintage, 2007), 4th of 11 stories in BM [Chandler would “cannibalize” this story for The Big Sleep – note the totem with the camera lens.]

~ George Harmon Coxe, “Murder Picture”, 7^th of 27 with Flashgun Casey, reprinted in The Black Lizard Big Book of Pulps (Vintage, 2007), 7^th of 31 stories in BM

~ George Alden Edson, “Hot Lead”, author’s only appearance in BM

~ Erle Stanley Gardner, “Winged Lead”, ‘Bald Pete’, character’s only appearance in BM, 84th of 99 stories in BM

©Seattle Mystery Bookshop

January 1929 issue ~ cover art by Fred Craft

January 1929 issue

cover art by Fred Craft

better image than previously posted

~ Eustace Hale Ball, “The Old Gray Mouse”, prison setting, last of 13 stories in BM

~ S. Omar Barker, “The Way of the Westerner”, ‘Pecos McKain; modern Western’, 1^st of 4 stories in BM

~ Katherine Brocklebank, “White Talons”, 2nd of 4 with ‘Tex of Border Service in Tia Juana; Tex is a woman!’ , reprinted in White Talons: The Complete Black Mask Cases of Tex of the Border Service (Steeger, 2023), 5^th of 7 stories in BM

~ Erle Stanley Gardner, “One Crook to Another”, 24th of 73 Ed Jenkins, 2nd of 2 parts with ‘Big Bill Delano & gang war’, 37th of 99 stories in BM

~ Dashiell Hammett, “Black Honeymoon”, 3rd of 4 Continental Op stories that will go together to make up The Dain Curse (Knopf hc, 1929), reprinted in The Big Book of the Continental Op (Vintage, 2017), 38th of 51 stories in BM

~ Anderson McCully, “The Rajah’s Bracelet”, ‘crime involving a group of socially prominent people’, 2nd of 2 stories in BM

~ Carl L. Martin, “The Discard”, Deputy Lon Havens, Drew County, Bayou country, 4th of 6 in BM

~ Marion Scott, “Poison Enters the Manse”, ‘1^st-person narrator & kidnapping’, last of 3 by herself, 17 stories with Earl Scott in BM as a couple

~ Edward Parrish Ware, “The Border Buckoes”, ‘Kid Shelley, 1^st-person narrator’, 8th of 9 stories in BM