Shakedown

by Richard Ellington

Originally published under the title "Just Killing Time".

152 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1953

Reviews

[Sam Reaves · Rating 3 out of 5]

Trolling in the vintage paperback bins again, I came across several books by this author I'd never heard of and picked one at random; it's a PI novel set in New York in the early fifties, with all the classic touches, the wisecracking tough-guy PI, the classy dame venturing timidly into the low-rent office with a dubious proposition, the suspicious characters who start popping up, etc., etc. Things go off the rails fast and before we know it our hero is witnessing murders and concealing things from the cops... you know the tale.
It's not bad; there's some interesting stuff about the early days of TV in New York (Ellington worked in radio, according to the scant biographical info online), it takes us backstage in the New York theater world, reveals secrets of the rich and famous, and in general it gives us what we want from an old-fashioned private eye yarn. But the plot meanders a bit and Steve Drake is not especially clever as shamuses go, his method basically being to go around announcing to all and sundry what he's up to until somebody takes a potshot at him. Decent marks for atmospherics, C minus for story.