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Mike Shayne #2
The Private Practice of Michael Shayne
Candidate for death ...
His name was Harry Grange and his type was common. Especially in Miami in the winter sucker season.
He was the kind of guy you never saw without a woman on his arm. And you saw him continually -- usually at one or another of the better upholstered sewers, drinking the better watered Scotch, mouthing the more exciting words of love.
Only with Harry it wasn't for pleasure.
With Harry it was strictly business ...
His name was Harry Grange and his type was common. Especially in Miami in the winter sucker season.
He was the kind of guy you never saw without a woman on his arm. And you saw him continually -- usually at one or another of the better upholstered sewers, drinking the better watered Scotch, mouthing the more exciting words of love.
Only with Harry it wasn't for pleasure.
With Harry it was strictly business ...
190 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published January 1, 1940
13 people are currently reading
98 people want to read
About the author
Brett Halliday
508 books62 followersAKA 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.
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.
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Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews
September 26, 2012
The Private Practice of Michael Shayne is Davis Dresser's second Mike Shayne novel (all of which were written under the "Brett Halliday" pseudonym), and it's as entertaining and fast-moving as the first, Dividend on Death. Shayne's tentative romance with the young débutante Phyllis Brighton takes a couple of steps forward while his antagonistic relationship with Miami police chief Peter Painter devolves from mutual hatred to outright loathing. Essentially, Dresser keeps everything from the first novel that works, while toning down the drawing room mystery antics and pumping up the hard-boiled tough-guy shenanigans just a little.
On a side note, I recently watched the 1940 film Michael Shayne: Private Detective, which stars Lloyd Nolan. Every source I've looked at (the Internet Movie Database, the Thrilling Detective web site, and even the film expert on the special features of the DVD) incorrectly states that the film is based on the first Michael Shayne novel, Dividend on Death, but that simply isn't the case. It is clearly based on this novel. I need backup on this one, people! If anyone feels like a homework assignment, read Dividend on Death and The Private Practice of Michael Shayne, then watch Michael Shayne: Private Detective and tell me if I'm wrong.
On a side note, I recently watched the 1940 film Michael Shayne: Private Detective, which stars Lloyd Nolan. Every source I've looked at (the Internet Movie Database, the Thrilling Detective web site, and even the film expert on the special features of the DVD) incorrectly states that the film is based on the first Michael Shayne novel, Dividend on Death, but that simply isn't the case. It is clearly based on this novel. I need backup on this one, people! If anyone feels like a homework assignment, read Dividend on Death and The Private Practice of Michael Shayne, then watch Michael Shayne: Private Detective and tell me if I'm wrong.
June 1, 2024
Another fun ride in the Shayne series. I found it very entertaining. I needed to scratch my detective itch once again and it didn't disappoint. If you're into hard boiled detectives this should be right up your alley. So light up a Lucky... And get your highball sit back and relax!
January 12, 2019
I have been listening to Michael Shayne on the old time radio mysteries, so thought I'd read one to see what the books were like as opposed to the radio. Shayne is the old-time hard-boiled private eye running his own game. An interesting case including a casino owner out to get him, the semi-standard chief of police desperate to hang a murder on him (any murder) and the newspaper writer going along for the story. Also, lots of beautiful women. A good plot with a twist I didn't quite expect.
August 25, 2010
It started out so well.
A slimeball everyone hates goes toe-to-toe with the detective, and shortly afterward his girlfriend turns up missing. The detective's best friend, a down-on-his-luck lawyer, turns up missing. The detective's gun. . .turns up missing.
Then the detective switches the barrel of his gun with the barrel of an identical gun in a complicated effort to get himself out of hot water, only to make things worse for himself by about a million percent and, hey, suddenly there's a new twist on hoisting yourself on your own petard!
Sure, Halliday's creating a cheap knock-off of Phillip Marlowe in his Michael Shayne character. And sure, forty-year-old Shayne's sweet on a teenager barely over the legal speed limit. It's pulp fiction. It was the fifties.
But when Shayne starts hanging around his missing buddy's house wiping his feet on the guy's wife for no reason except that she's his wife, she had had an opinion on whether or not being a down-on-his-luck lawyer was going to land them in the poorhouse, she had shared her opinion with her husband, and, apparently, that made her there for the foot-wiping. . .yeah, you lost all my sympathy, Halliday.
Is it a crime for an economic dependent in Halliday's cheap knock-off fifties world to be a real human being?
Apparently.
A slimeball everyone hates goes toe-to-toe with the detective, and shortly afterward his girlfriend turns up missing. The detective's best friend, a down-on-his-luck lawyer, turns up missing. The detective's gun. . .turns up missing.
Then the detective switches the barrel of his gun with the barrel of an identical gun in a complicated effort to get himself out of hot water, only to make things worse for himself by about a million percent and, hey, suddenly there's a new twist on hoisting yourself on your own petard!
Sure, Halliday's creating a cheap knock-off of Phillip Marlowe in his Michael Shayne character. And sure, forty-year-old Shayne's sweet on a teenager barely over the legal speed limit. It's pulp fiction. It was the fifties.
But when Shayne starts hanging around his missing buddy's house wiping his feet on the guy's wife for no reason except that she's his wife, she had had an opinion on whether or not being a down-on-his-luck lawyer was going to land them in the poorhouse, she had shared her opinion with her husband, and, apparently, that made her there for the foot-wiping. . .yeah, you lost all my sympathy, Halliday.
Is it a crime for an economic dependent in Halliday's cheap knock-off fifties world to be a real human being?
Apparently.
May 18, 2017
The Private Practice of Mike Shayne is the second book in a series that grew to nearly eighty volumes, but it's still one of the best in the entire series. In fact, it really set a high standard for the pulp-era private eye novel. This book features Shayne at his hardboiled, darkest best. Although it takes place in sunny Miami, you'd never know it from the dark grim tone of this story. Juxtaposed against the dark background is Shayne's romance with the young innocent Phyllis.
This story features quite a few motifs that are later repeated in many other Shayne novels including the murder frame-up, the run-ins with Peter Painter, the merciless battles with out-of-town hoods, the gambling joints where Shayne confronts the corrupt manager, the bar fights where Shayne takes a beating and keeps getting up, the rich heiress in trouble, the so-called friend who turns on Shayne, the evidence tampering, and more.
The story flows really well and is great fun to read.
This story features quite a few motifs that are later repeated in many other Shayne novels including the murder frame-up, the run-ins with Peter Painter, the merciless battles with out-of-town hoods, the gambling joints where Shayne confronts the corrupt manager, the bar fights where Shayne takes a beating and keeps getting up, the rich heiress in trouble, the so-called friend who turns on Shayne, the evidence tampering, and more.
The story flows really well and is great fun to read.
January 25, 2022
The Private Practice of Michael Shayne, Brett Halliday, 1940
My favorite quote: “The moon had not yet risen, and stars studded the dark velvety blue of the tropical sky, casting an illusively perceptible sheen through the still night.”
Notable characters: Mike Shayne, the PI; Larry Kincaid, his friend; Harry Grange, the crooked lawyer; Phyllis Brighton, the love interest
Most memorable scene: When Mike Shayne is arrested for murder (dun, dun, DUN!)
Greatest strengths: It’s ability to make me completely overlook the fact that I’m reading outdated, low-grade, cheesy pulp fiction ranks up there pretty high
Standout achievements: The grim seediness of this one does great justice to the hardboiled genre
Fun Facts: This is the second novel in a series that went on to produce seventy-seven books in total, not all of them written by the same author
Other media: The 1940 film, Michael Shayne, Private Detective, starring Lloyd Nolan
What it taught me: What a dewlap is. I never want one.
How it inspired me: While many of the characters in this series — but Michael Shayne, especially — walk the gray line of right and wrong, they all believe that they’re doing what’s right. When the bad guys think they’re the heroes of the story, it adds a layer of realness to the plot that can make even the most outlandish storyline more believable. I keep this in mind in my own writing with the hope of avoiding one-dimensional villains
Additional thoughts: While I do enjoy this series, I can’t help but hold out some hope that as it progresses, Private Investigator Mike Shayne will develop into someone a bit more lifelike. And likable. I guess you could say he’s a dick in more ways than one
Haunt me: alistaircross.com
My favorite quote: “The moon had not yet risen, and stars studded the dark velvety blue of the tropical sky, casting an illusively perceptible sheen through the still night.”
Notable characters: Mike Shayne, the PI; Larry Kincaid, his friend; Harry Grange, the crooked lawyer; Phyllis Brighton, the love interest
Most memorable scene: When Mike Shayne is arrested for murder (dun, dun, DUN!)
Greatest strengths: It’s ability to make me completely overlook the fact that I’m reading outdated, low-grade, cheesy pulp fiction ranks up there pretty high
Standout achievements: The grim seediness of this one does great justice to the hardboiled genre
Fun Facts: This is the second novel in a series that went on to produce seventy-seven books in total, not all of them written by the same author
Other media: The 1940 film, Michael Shayne, Private Detective, starring Lloyd Nolan
What it taught me: What a dewlap is. I never want one.
How it inspired me: While many of the characters in this series — but Michael Shayne, especially — walk the gray line of right and wrong, they all believe that they’re doing what’s right. When the bad guys think they’re the heroes of the story, it adds a layer of realness to the plot that can make even the most outlandish storyline more believable. I keep this in mind in my own writing with the hope of avoiding one-dimensional villains
Additional thoughts: While I do enjoy this series, I can’t help but hold out some hope that as it progresses, Private Investigator Mike Shayne will develop into someone a bit more lifelike. And likable. I guess you could say he’s a dick in more ways than one
Haunt me: alistaircross.com
December 14, 2017
Better written than the first book (Dividend on Death) but still not very good. A lot of these Shayne books do a good job of drawing you in at the beginning. He lays the atmosphere on thick and sets up an intriguing mystery. Where it goes from there doesn't always seem to be the same level of quality.
Like all the Mike Shayne books it's somewhat ridiculous how many people he gets to run errands for him. Everybody in Miami apparently owes Mike Shayne a million favors because he goes around barking orders at everyone to which they adoringly comply. At one point he literally just stops a complete stranger on the street, has the guy witness him recovering some evidence, and directs him to the nearest lawyer to draw up and sign and affidavit. Oh yeah, no problem. I was just going to the beach with my girlfriend here but forget that, I'll just waste the rest of the day sitting in a lawyers office for you Mike Shayne. Anything for you Mike Shayne. Just once, I'd love it for someone to tell him to get stuffed.
As another Goodreads review mentions, treatment of female characters is particularly awful in this one. I won't get into it to much other than to say it is just not even close to acceptable even for 1941. It just gives you the further impression that at this point Halliday has no clue how to write for female characters or any sort of realistic male-female interaction.
Oh yeah, and that cover with Shayne emerging from the water in evening wear? Nothing in that illustration happens in the book.
Like all the Mike Shayne books it's somewhat ridiculous how many people he gets to run errands for him. Everybody in Miami apparently owes Mike Shayne a million favors because he goes around barking orders at everyone to which they adoringly comply. At one point he literally just stops a complete stranger on the street, has the guy witness him recovering some evidence, and directs him to the nearest lawyer to draw up and sign and affidavit. Oh yeah, no problem. I was just going to the beach with my girlfriend here but forget that, I'll just waste the rest of the day sitting in a lawyers office for you Mike Shayne. Anything for you Mike Shayne. Just once, I'd love it for someone to tell him to get stuffed.
As another Goodreads review mentions, treatment of female characters is particularly awful in this one. I won't get into it to much other than to say it is just not even close to acceptable even for 1941. It just gives you the further impression that at this point Halliday has no clue how to write for female characters or any sort of realistic male-female interaction.
Oh yeah, and that cover with Shayne emerging from the water in evening wear? Nothing in that illustration happens in the book.
December 19, 2020
3.5 Stars Good Story
I liked the first book better. This one was not as fluid a read. All in all it still was an interesting and entertaining read.
I liked the first book better. This one was not as fluid a read. All in all it still was an interesting and entertaining read.
May 11, 2021
This one just oozes testosterone. As noir as they come.
July 10, 2016
This is the second Michael Shayne, where we find out a little more about why Chief Painter hates him and how he developed a relationship with Phyllis Brightman, a young woman that he saved from a murder rap in the first book of the series. In this one he is asked by a young lawyer friend to help a man who is being blackmailed and he refuses. But because Mike always seems to know more than he often does, he is black jacked, beaten up, and taken for a ride. He does get to the bottom of gambling irregularities both at casinos and the race track, and solves a couple of murders, all before Peter Painter can slap him in jail. He's hard boiled and likes it that way!
December 21, 2009
I don't know whether I'm getting used to Halliday's stories or if the latest actually was a bit better, but I enjoyed it more. Still pretty low-grade pulp, but a bit more fun. At least this time he only got beat up once and didn't get shot at all.
Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews