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The Guilty Bystander
Ace Double, printed with "Kill Me With Kindness" by J. Harvey Bond.
123 pages, Paperback
Published January 1, 1959
3 people want to read
About the author
Mike Brett
3 booksLibrarian Note: There is more than one author by this name in the Goodreads database.
Michael Brett published under this name, too.
Michael Brett published under this name, too.
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Displaying 1 of 1 review
March 11, 2026
In the two Sam Dakkers novels, Brett utilizes an everyman character as his hard-boiled hero. Sam Dakkers is a bald-headed bookie who ought to be keeping his head down and minding his own business, but it never quite seems to work out that way for him. At the beginning of “The Guilty Bystander,” Dakkers describes himself as: “In fact, according to my police record they’ve got me listed as Sam Dakkers, age 32, weight 185, eyes gray, five feet ten, occupation: bookmaker. It goes on to say: previous arrests, 13, convictions four, all for making book. And where it comes to hair it says, hair, none. It’s for sure that I don’t bear any resemblance to Gregory Peck, but that doesn’t mean I look like Buster Keaton either. I’d say, what with my striking bald pate and skull structure, I’m sort of a poor man’s Yul Brunner.”
The novel is fast-paced and features Dakkers virtually on his own being the obvious suspect in more than one bloody murder with the police on his tail and heavy-handed mobsters as well. It opens with doll with silver-blonde hair and a backless black dress, giving Dakkers the eye in a bar. She is Carol Gardner, drunk, loose, and later admitting to being a mobster’s doll, but only admitting that in her apartment, after tearing her clothes off, gyrating in a crazy modern dance, and hearing her boyfriend, Crazy Benny Flumshin at the door. Quick, without even his shoes, Dakkers is out the window and down the fire escape, but before he can get lost in the city, he hears gunshots and climbs back up only to find dear sweet luscious Carol dead in bed and bleeding all over the place and, before he knows it, Dakkers is the prime suspect at the scene. Meanwhile, Crazy Benny has the best alibi in the world: he spent the night in jail.
Although Dakkers is the prime suspect, being that he was found at the bloody crime scene with the corpse, the police give him a little rope, but for Dakkers, like it is often said, if he did not have bad luck, he would not have any luck at all. Before he knows it, he is awakened from a deep sleep in his own apartment with a man with a large knife hovering over him. Somehow, Dakkers manages unarmed and undressed to get free but not without leaving another bloody corpse behind, although strangely enough he goes in person to report the corpse to the police and the corpse (now alleged corpse) is missing when they return to the apartment.
Dakkers, being a bookie and underworld character, knows he cannot count on anyone to get him out of this mess and has to figure it out all on his own. Well, practically on his own, because when he hides out in a friend’s apartment, the friend forgets to tell him that Summer Terry has an appointment to model nude for the friend’s new hobby of painting. Summer is perhaps not quite what the doctor ordered, but she decides to stick to Dakkers like glue for the rest of the book, not playing necessarily a major role, but being there spurring on high blood pressure even when Dakkers is driving out to face off with mob figures and Crazy Benny (remember him?).
In all, Brett offers up both in this novel and in Scream Street, a fun, exciting, fast-moving story that will keep you entertained.
The novel is fast-paced and features Dakkers virtually on his own being the obvious suspect in more than one bloody murder with the police on his tail and heavy-handed mobsters as well. It opens with doll with silver-blonde hair and a backless black dress, giving Dakkers the eye in a bar. She is Carol Gardner, drunk, loose, and later admitting to being a mobster’s doll, but only admitting that in her apartment, after tearing her clothes off, gyrating in a crazy modern dance, and hearing her boyfriend, Crazy Benny Flumshin at the door. Quick, without even his shoes, Dakkers is out the window and down the fire escape, but before he can get lost in the city, he hears gunshots and climbs back up only to find dear sweet luscious Carol dead in bed and bleeding all over the place and, before he knows it, Dakkers is the prime suspect at the scene. Meanwhile, Crazy Benny has the best alibi in the world: he spent the night in jail.
Although Dakkers is the prime suspect, being that he was found at the bloody crime scene with the corpse, the police give him a little rope, but for Dakkers, like it is often said, if he did not have bad luck, he would not have any luck at all. Before he knows it, he is awakened from a deep sleep in his own apartment with a man with a large knife hovering over him. Somehow, Dakkers manages unarmed and undressed to get free but not without leaving another bloody corpse behind, although strangely enough he goes in person to report the corpse to the police and the corpse (now alleged corpse) is missing when they return to the apartment.
Dakkers, being a bookie and underworld character, knows he cannot count on anyone to get him out of this mess and has to figure it out all on his own. Well, practically on his own, because when he hides out in a friend’s apartment, the friend forgets to tell him that Summer Terry has an appointment to model nude for the friend’s new hobby of painting. Summer is perhaps not quite what the doctor ordered, but she decides to stick to Dakkers like glue for the rest of the book, not playing necessarily a major role, but being there spurring on high blood pressure even when Dakkers is driving out to face off with mob figures and Crazy Benny (remember him?).
In all, Brett offers up both in this novel and in Scream Street, a fun, exciting, fast-moving story that will keep you entertained.
Displaying 1 of 1 review