What Really Happened

Mike Shayne #21

by Brett Halliday

From title Everyone had a tale to tell Michael Shayne. He had too many suspects to start with, and all of them were over-anxious to link themselves with murder. Some of them had actually come running to him with their stories before the crime was committed!

The Shamus had to fill in the details himself and none of them were pretty. They dealt with secret assignations, queer sex exhibitions, blackmail--and brutal death. And the final punch-line was one of the most startling in Mike Shayne's violent career.

Genres: Mystery

Paperback

First published January 1, 1952

About the author

AKA David Dresser
Excerpt from Wikipedia:

Brett Halliday (July 31, 1904 - February 4, 1977), primary pen name of Davis Dresser, was an American mystery writer, best known for the long-lived series of Mike Shayne novels he wrote, and later commissioned others to write. Dresser wrote non-series mysteries, westerns and romances under the names

Asa Baker, Matthew Blood, Kathryn Culver, Don Davis, Hal Debrett, Anthony Scott, Peter Field, and Anderson Wayne.

Reviews

[Craig Pittman · Rating 3 out of 5]

Entertaining but very, very dated PI novel set in Miami in the early 1950s. The Depression and World War II are still very recent events, and the plot -- a fairly clever one involving a phony alibi that would later be ripped off by "Columbo" and other TV shows -- depends on the use of a newfangled device called a "tape recorder." There are trigger-happy gangsters and blackmail-worthy upstanding citizens and an odd scene involving a cross-dressing TV producer. Hard-drinking, hard-punching private eye Mike Shayne comes across as a classic private eye stereotype but little more, although at the end you wonder a bit at his ethics regarding where he gets his money for solving the case. Still the sense of place -- of Miami as a spot where all these interesting characters would thrive amid the palms -- is palpable, and helps explain the series' longevity.

[Dave · Rating 4 out of 5]

The twentieth Mike Shayne mystery features this Miami private eye in a classic who-done-it with letters from the murdered damsel pointing to at least a quartet of suspects, each with a motive. Shayne doggedly hunts down the clues and witnesses until he can gather all the suspects in a room with police Chief Gentry where Shayne can point out the true culprit. There were some 77 Shayne mystery novels written under the house name Brett Halliday and they are all good sid classic mysteries.

[Trounin · Rating 3 out of 5]

Читатели детективов любят говорить, что они думали именно на того, на кого в итоге указал автор. И не задумываются такие читатели, насколько стремился им в том потворствовать сам автор. Не скажешь, чтобы Бретт Холлидей поставил перед собой такую же задачу. Он просто дал интересную вводную, полностью провалив всё далее им описываемое. Когда пришла пора кого-то обвинить в совершённом преступлении, то был выбран случайный человек, на месте которого могло оказаться любое из действующих лиц.

(c) Trounin

[Kurt Reichenbaugh · Rating 3 out of 5]

A blackmailer is murdered just after she makes a frantic phone call to Mike Shayne, private eye. The word "shamus" is tossed around a lot. There's probably a quart and a half of cognac consumed in the space of twenty-four hours. Mike gets to muss up a dame's lipstick and throw a few punches. A police chief gets to bark at people about concealing evidence. There's some gunplay at night and a nightclub owner shoves his weight around. An old stag film resurfaces and a debutant may get to marry a stuffed shirt. That's what really happened. It was short. It was fast. It was okay.

[John Marr · Rating 3 out of 5]

Mike Shayne may be a tough PI, but this one is more like a conventional mystery with an investigator that gets hit over the head periodically. But the puzzle is good, the pacing is brisk, and the technology used in the big showdown is good for a few chuckles.

[Mark Stratton]

What Really Happened by Brett Halliday (1952)