Frails Can Be So Tough

Hank Janson - Series Three #4

by Hank Janson (Pseudonym), Stephen D. Frances, Reginald Heade (Cover Artist)

Lee Shelton is a man with a tragic past and a deeply troubled present. Framed for a murder he didn’t commit, forced to kidnap and chain up a beautiful passer-by – who turns out to be a millionairess – in order to avoid capture, and with a broken hypodermic needle buried in his festering arm, he finds events conspiring against him. Will he be able to get out from under all these problems, or is a lengthy prison sentence – or even death – what fate has in store for him? This Telos edition of Frails Can Be So Tough reinstates the previously-unpublished original cover artwork by Reginald Heade, which was censored when the novel first appeared in 1951. Includes an introduction by pulp historian and writer Steve Holland.

175 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1951

About the author

A pseudonym used by Stephen Frances and Victor Norwood.

Hank Janson was the most popular and successful of British pulp fiction authors of the 1940s and 1950s. It was estimated that over five million of the author's books had been sold by 1954.

'When Dames Ge Tough' was the first Hank Janson novel in 1946 and there were around 220 featuring the tough Chicago reporter through to 'The Young Wolves' in 1968.

Many of the later novels were reputed to be the work of other authors.