The Real Cool Killers

Harlem Cycle #2

by Chester Himes

'The toughest crime stories in print' Sunday Times

The night's over for Ulysses Galen. It started going bad for the big Greek when a knife was drawn, then there was an axe, then he was being chased and shot at. Now Galen is lying dead in the middle of a Harlem street. But the night's just beginning for detectives Grave Digger Jones and Coffin Ed Johnson. Because they have a smoking gun but it couldn't have killed Galen, and they had a suspect but a gang called the Real Cool Moslems took him. And as patrol cars and search teams descend on the neighbourhood, their case threatens to take a turn for the personal.

The Real Cool Killers is loaded with grizzly comedy and with all the raucous, threatening energy of the streets it's set on.

Genres: Mystery, Fiction, Crime, Noir, African American, American, 20th Century

ebook

First published January 1, 1958

About the author

Chester Bomar Himes began writing in the early 1930s while serving a prison sentence for armed robbery. From there, he produced short stories for periodicals such as Esquire and Abbott's Monthly. When released, he focussed on semi-autobiographical protest novels.

In 1953, Himes emigrated to France, where he was approached by Marcel Duhamel of Gallimard to write a detective series for Série Noire, which had published works from the likes of Raymond Chandler, Dashiell Hammett and Jim Thompson. Himes would be the first black author included in the series. The resulting Harlem Cycle gained him celebrity when he won France's Grand Prix de Littérature Policière for La Reine des Pommes (now known in English as A Rage in Harlem) in 1958. Three of these novels have been adapted into movies: Cotton Comes to Harlem, directed by Ossie Davis in 1970; Come Back, Charleston Blue (based on The Heat's On) in 1972; and A Rage in Harlem, starring Gregory Hines and Danny Glover in 1991.

In 1968, Himes moved to Spain where he made his home until his death.

Reviews

[Dan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ulysses Galen is shot down in the streets of Harlem and Grave Digger Jones and Coffin Ed Johnson are on the case. The prime suspect is a member of a gang calling themselves The Real Cool Moslems. After an incident with the Moslems, Coffin Ed is suspended. Good thing, since one of the girls that runs with the Moslems is his teenaged daughter...

It's a crime that Chester Himes isn't more well known than he is. The writing in The Real Cool Killers is gritty and straight to the point. I can see Himes's influence in not only Joe Lansdale's writing but also James Ellroy's. Himes's Harlem isn't a nice place to live, that's for sure. The revelation of who actually killed Galen is fairly surprising.

I think I'll be tracking down the rest of the Harlem Detectives series. Coffin Ed and Grave Digger Jones are ass-kicking machines and I'd like to see them on another case where they can fully cut loose.

[carol.]

I think this will be a pass.

Written in 1958, there's much here that will feel a lot like sad, horrible, violent 2020. Some blurbs call it 'action-filled' and 'over-the-top,' but I'd call it scathing social commentary. Dress it up and make it 'funny,' but wow, there's desperation, heartbreak, addiction, violence, cycles, inequity, and enough 'ism to destroy a character. Which is, indeed, the point. How can you even blame Coffin Ed for killing the kid that threw perfume on him, when he has a history of someone tossing acid in his face? Or blame the cops for covering it up?

The story begins with a white man in a bar, accused of fooling around with someone's wife. The accuser is exceedingly drunk and is working himself up towards attacking with a knife when the bartender gets involved with a machete. The white guy escapes and is watching the ensuing chaos from the outside when yet another intoxicated black man approaches from behind and accuses him of the same thing. The white guy runs and the accuser chases through the streets of Harlem, attracting hecklers and bystanders, including a suspicious group of young black men called the 'Real Cool Moslems' (s.i.c.) who run around dressing as 'Arabs.' The young men hide out in a local tenement and during their discussion, I lost my interest.

"The other front windows were jammed with colored faces, looking like clusters of strange purple fruit in the stark white light.

The first book in this series was amazing, as read by the incomparable Samuel M.F. Jackson, and perhaps he could save this, but I think between the relentless amorality of the youngsters and the relentlessly aggressive amorality of black detectives Grave Digger and Coffin Ed, the 1950w era racism and the police corruption, it's just not going to work for me right now.

They looked like big-shouldered plowhands in Sunday suits at a Saturday night jamboree."

Note: quit at chapter 7/p.60

[Bill Kerwin · Rating 5 out of 5]

This second novel by the first great African-American writer of mystery stories is a classic, deserving a place in the pantheon, right up there with The Maltese Falcon, The Big Sleep, and The Big Chill.

The story is set in Harlem in the ‘50s, and begins with the shooting of a white man and the arrest of a member of a small local gang called “The Real Cool Moslems.” At first the case seems open-and-shut, for the chase and shooting is witnessed by a score of people on a busy Harlem street. But there’s a problem: the bullet that killed the white man couldn’t have come from from the teenager’s gun.

The plot and the characters are both very good—particularly our two heros, the black Harlem detectives Coffin Ed Johnson and Gravedigger Jones—but the real beauty of the book lies in the extraordinary liveliness of the prose, the way it conveys movement, and the color and richness of the imagery too—all of which adds up to a vivid portrait of Harlem. Hime’s prose makes me think not of writers but of caricaturists, painters, movie-makers: Daumier, Grosz; Brueghel, Rivera; Fellini, Scorsese. Himes makes memorable images, but he knows how to “move his camera” too.

Here’s a vivid passage from the beginning of the novel. In the Harlem Dew Drop Inn, a little guy pulls a knife on the white man who will soon end up dead in the street. But first he has to deal with the bartender, Big Smiley:

Big Smiley leaned across the bar and grabbed the red-eyed knifeman by the lapels of his mackinaw and lifted him from the floor.

“Gimme that chiv, shorty, ‘fore I makes you eat it,” he said lazily, smiling as though it were a joke.

The knifeman twisted in his grip and slashed him across the arm. The white fabric of his jacket slevve parted like a burst balloon and his black-skinned muscles opened like the Red Sea ….

Big Smiley draw back and reached beneath the bar counter with his right hand. He came up with a short-handled fireman’s axe. It had a red handle and a honed, razor-sharp blade.

The little knifeman jumped into the air and slashed at Big Smiley again, matching his knife against Big Smiley’s axe.

Big Smiley countered with a right cross with the red-handled axe. The blade met the knifeman’s arm in the middle of its stroke and cut it off just below the elbow as though it had been guillotined.

The severed arm in its coat sleeve, still clutching the knife, sailed through the air, sprinkling the nearby spectators with drops of blood, landed on the linoleum tile floor, and skidded beneath the table of a booth.

The little knifeman landed on his feet, still making cutting motions with his half arm.

[Carol · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you are intending to read only one of Chester Himes' novels, read A Rage in Harlem. But once you've read that, read this. Candidly, the first 75% of The Real Cool Killers is routine, not special, nothing to mention to a friend. Then -abruptly -it becomes the 5-star read you'd been anticipating. Trenchant social commentary. Abominable, ongoing abuse in which many members of the community are complicit. The intense protectiveness of one cop by other cops who know something bad is going down with his daughter and (a) don't want him to find out, and (b) don't want to witness his discovery, if they are unsuccessful in hiding it from him.

Not sold yet?

Read this spot-on review from my GR friend, Lemar:https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

[Jack Tripper · Rating 5 out of 5]

Here's the (very nearly as cool as the original Avon) cover of the 1975 Signet mass-market, 173 pages.

My first and and still the best of the Harlem Cycle novels I've read so far, The Real Cool Killers paints a harrowing, bleak portrait of the atmosphere and attitudes of late-1950s Harlem, with main characters "Grave Digger" Jones and "Coffin" Ed Johnson as somewhat exaggerated, larger-than-life versions of badass NYC cops. They're great characters, and they -- as well as the overall feel of the novel in general -- reminded me of certain blaxploitation films of the 70s such as Shaft and Superfly. I wonder if these books served as inspiration for the movement in any way, though it could be possible that those movies (and that cover) influenced the way I imagined everything here instead.

Chester Himes was a fine storyteller, and his unencumbered-yet-evocative prose really pulls the reader into the streets of inner-city Harlem. You can tell that he knew what he was talking about; he clearly wasn't faking it, and that adds a layer of realism to everything. His depiction of teenage street gangs is horrifying, but he makes the reader not only understand why they have the attitudes they have, but actually sympathize with them, which is quite an accomplishment in light of some of their disturbing actions.

It's also action-packed, with an insanely over-the-top bar fight scene (featuring an axe-wielder) that will stick with me for a while, and the pages kept turning til I finished the whole thing in just a couple of sittings. For fans of hardboiled/noir-type novels, and for those just looking for a fast-moving tale of the streets with a dose of social commentary for good measure, The Real Cool Killers is a top-notch read.

4.5 Stars

[robin friedman · Rating 4 out of 5]

A Harlem Novel In Noir

From its beginnings in detective magazines and pulp fiction, American noir developed into literature of varied people and places. Chester Himes (1909 --1984) was one of the first African Americans to write noir. Imprisoned as a young man,Himes spent much of his life in France where he created a series involving two African American detectives, Grave Digger Jones and Coffin Ed Johnson, with a beat in Harlem. Some of the novels in the series were first published in French as Himes remained relatively unknown in his native land.

Published in 1959, "The Real Cool Killers" was the third of the series. Unlike some noir, the book is in part a who-done-it, as Jones and Johnson try to find the killer of one Ulysses Galen, a white salesman of a brand of soft drink, on a busy Harlem street. The plot becomes contrived with a number of surprising twists. The interest in the book lies much less in the plot than in the creation of atmosphere at the heart of noir writing. Himes understands and portrays Harlem and its people. The book frequently is sharply penetrating, descriptive, tragic, or bitingly funny. He is perceptive in developing his characters beyond stereotypes. And his writing is full of memorable passages and one-liners.

A good deal of the novel is set in a Harlem bar, the Dew Drop Inn, where Galen is a rare white patron. The bartender, Big Smiley, sets the tone of the establishment. The story opens with a large fight scene at the Dew Drop in involving Galen, Big Smiley, and a third individual who displays enormous and unexplained anger towards Galen. When Galen flees the establishment he is mysteriously gunned down on the street. The two detective heroes search for the killer.

The characters include a gang of teenagers led by "Shiek" who dress as Arabs together with Shiek's two young girlfriends. Among the other characters are several policemen, at all levels of the NYPD, a number of suspects, a madam, and a pimp.

As the novel develops, sadistic sex comes to play a major role. Yet, Himes portrays most of his characters with substantial care. With the exception of the villain, they are nuanced and not wholly good or evil. Jones and Johnson are shown as dedicated and intelligent law enforcement officers, but they often use violence, intimidation, and brutality to get their way. The white detectives and offices are likewise shown as varied human beings, with strong prejudices that accompany their virtues. In some comic scenes, the officers are almost unbelievably stupid. Yet things haltingly fall into place.

The main character of the book is Harlem which is portrayed realistically and unsentimenally in all its rawness. Himes captures Harlem's poverty, vice, and simmering rage, rather than a literary Harlem or a Harlem for visitors. The book also portrays sharp racial tension and oppression, with distrust and prejudice among both white and African American people. Sharp racial epithets and stereotyping occur throughout the book.

Himes' novel portrays a place and shows the effect of prejudice and poverty as well as telling a gripping story. It evocatively presents a Harlem noir. I was reminded of a contemporary African American writer of noir, Walter Mosley who has written several different series of crime novels, the most famous of which is the Easy Rawlins series, set in California. It includes the novel, "Devil in a Blue Dress" which in its setting bears some resemblance to "The Real Cool Killers". Himes' novel is available in the single edition I am reviewing here and in a compilation of American noir from the 1950s published by the Library of America. It will be of interest to readers of African American literature and to readers of noir.

Robin Friedman

[Richard · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is the 2nd book in Chester Himes's Harlem Cycle and it's just as absurd and insane as his previous masterpiece in the series, A Rage in Harlem, which I loved. The plot starts almost immediately and moves at a breakneck pace. Just like in A Rage In Harlem, the story is so crazy, and the writing so sharp, that it's hard to stop reading. Something that sets Chester Himes apart from so many others is his ability to inject a mix of witty comedy and social commentary into his work, as well as astute observations about living in Harlem in the '50's:

"The white manager stood on top of the bar and shouted, 'Please remain seated, folks. Everybody go back to his seat and pay his bill. The police have been called and everything will be taken care of.'

As though he'd fired a starting gun, there was a race for the door."

The super-hard-boiled Harlem detectives, Grave Digger Jones and Coffin Ed Johnson, are back on the job again when a big Greek dude gets shot and killed by a fake gun in the middle of a crowded street in Harlem, causing all hell to break loose. After Coffin Ed gets suspended for blasting his .38 all over 128th Street when some little gangster throws perfume at him (Coffin Ed had a little run-in with some acid a while back), Grave Digger investigates the case solo. Throughout the course of one night, he discovers that there is more to the case that he originally thought, and it seems like all connections lead to some young hookers and a gang that calls themselves the Real Cool Moslems.

Himes's descriptions throughout the novel are richly evocative with his usual playfulness. Should he be considered the James Brown of Crime Fiction? There, I coined it first! You can practically smell, hear, and taste his wicked version of Harlem. Check out this gem:

"The joint was jammed with colored people who'd seen the big man die, but nobody seemed to be worrying about it.
The jukebox was giving out with a stomp version of 'Big-Legged Woman.' Saxophones were pleading; the horns were teasing; the bass was patting; the drums were chatting; the piano was catting, laying and playing the jive, and a husky female voice was shouting:

'...you can feel my thigh
But don't you feel up high.'

Happy-tail women were bouncing out of their dresses on the high bar stools.
Grave Digger trod on the sawdust sprinkled over the bloodstains that wouldn't wash off and parked on the stool at the end of the bar."

Once again, an entertaining read from the great Chester Himes.

[Lemar · Rating 5 out of 5]

Chester Himes drops his readers right into the mix, Harlem circa 1958. Some books boast colorful characters, these books are unrivaled in characters that know how to survive in one of the toughest environments ever created. As he tells a compelling story, Himes gets across the reality that Harlem of this time was a construct of white America, a deliberate ghetto every bit as much as the historic European ghettos built to contain the Jews.

The Real Cool Killers gets into the world of juveniles and, as always, the characters hold up as genuine, never caricatures. Himes sees people in all their shades of imperfection and beauty. He is allegedly writing dime store novels but actually delivering Dostoyevsky.

[Sharon Barrow Wilfong · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed this Crime Noir better than usual, since I have discovered that Crime Noir is not my favorite genre.

A white man is at a bar in Harlem looking around. Why is he there? This is Harlem in the 1950s and he is the only white man in the bar. A black man approaches him with a switch blade saying that he knows why the man is there and he's not going to "diddle his little gals". He slashes at the man with his knife.

The bartender prevents the man from injuring the white man by seriously injuring the man with the knife. I won't go into it but it is really violent.

The white man exits the bar but is accosted by another man named Sammy who yells, hey, you're the one that was with my sister and pulls a gun on him. The white man runs down the street with Sammy in hot pursuit.

A gang of teenagers called, The Real Cool Muslims, see what is happening and join the chase. Sammy shoots at the man and he goes down. By this time two local policemen arrive and run up to the white man who is now dead. They get ready to arrest Sammy but also ask the gang members questions. The young thugs are belligerent and one throws perfume in the face of one of the cops. This cop, Coffin Ed is terrified. His face is already scarred from having acid thrown in his face before. He shoots the youth dead before realizing it was only perfume. Now there are two dead people lying on the street.

During the confusion after the second death, the gang and Sammy run off. Coffin Ed and his partner Gravedigger Jones, have already confiscated Sammy's gun and they discover that it is only a stage prop and could not have killed the white man. So who did?

The rest of the story is the police investigation but mostly it is a commentary on life in Harlem. The gang of Muslims, are not really Muslims but black teenagers. The story spends a long time with them showing what makes them tick. Just what little it takes to make people violent when they know nothing else and cannot imagine a life greater than being a gangster.

The story is dark, violent and extremely sad, probably because even though it was written in 1959, it is sadly reflective of reality in poor neighborhoods today. Only now it is worse because instead of knives, young people are killing each other with automatic weapons.

Chester Himes writes about what he knows. He spent several years in prison for armed robbery where he began writing fiction. Later he achieve literary success and many of his stories were made into films. The Real Cool Killers is one of a series called the Harlem Detective novels with the black detectives Gravedigger Jones and Coffin Ed. In At Home in Diaspora: Black International Writing, Wendy Walters describes the detectives as "viable folk heroes for the urban community."

Himes later moved to Paris where he became good friends with Langston Hughes, Richard Wright, James Baldwin and Malcolm X. Eventually Himes and his second wife, Lesley, a beautiful white woman of whom he described as "the only color-blind person I met in my life" moved to Barcelona where they lived until he died from Parkinson's Disease in 1984.

[L J Field · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was a much more serious book than the previous, first book in the series—Rage in Harlem. While the first book was filled with uproarious humor, this one was more sympathetic and personal in its characterizations. There is a gang in Harlem known, mostly to themselves, as the The Real Cool Moslems. Actually they are black teenagers dressed in Moslem garb. There is a shooting and killing of a white man and the police suspect the gang is involved. Graveyard Jones and Coffin Ed Johnson are brought in to find the killer. This is a violent story with policemen acting in ways that are incomprehensible to the modern reader. But I don’t know how far from the truth these actions were in that time period—shortly after World War 2.

The story takes place in a fast six hour time frame, from the moment of the killing, to the solution of the crime. For me it was about a five hour read, making the story electric in its urgency. I followed the investigation in a minute by minute explosion of activity as more and more lives became at stake.

This is an excellent crime novel. I’m pretty certain that I read it some thirty or so years ago as one of the first publications in the Vintage Crime series. But I’d completely forgotten the story, so it was new and exciting for me. This book is well worth your time.

[Mizuki · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have been hearing about this series for a long time, let's find out!

(1) The time is the 1950s, so there is lot and lot of racism and police brutality!

(2) We go straight to the point and we have two corpses so far, fast pacing is always the key!

(3) The sense of humor is hard to place, though!

(4) The ending part is getting really exciting 😃

(5) Overall, it is refreshing to read an old-school hard-boiled novel as entertaining and effective as The Real Cool Killer. Chester B. Hime, You are the man!

The plot and the setting is eyepoppingly over-the-top, the characters are a vivid lot, and I like how the story reflects and makes comments on the racism and tension among races in the 1950s American society.

(6) It is an enjoyable roller coaster of cop-and-robber chase, I like the plot twist at the very end too.

My review for The Heat's On: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

[Tom Mooney · Rating 5 out of 5]

Absolutely my favourite of Himes's Harlem cycle, of the ones I've read so far (I have read them in totally random order as I've found them).

It starts with a knife fight, the swing of an axe and a chase down a packed Harlem street, and proceeds through a madcap manhunt to it's violent conclusion.

The writing is so hot in The Real Cool Killers, there are so many awesome passages you just want to share with everyone. He had an amazing ability to nail people or places in just a savage line or two. Absolute genius. And his view of Harlem is brilliantly realised - something Himes was never matched in, except maybe by Ralph Ellison.

A supremely tough, violent and very funny thriller that carves itself a hole somewhere between Ed Mcbain's police procedurals and Elmore Leonard's cool capers. Pure class.

[Colin Mitchell · Rating 4 out of 5]

The second in Chester Himes Harlem Cycle has the duo of black cops, Coffin Ed and Gravedigger, are up to their eyes in killings in Harlem. A big white Greek is chased from a bar and shot while in the bar the barman is taking an axe to a man with a knife.

Lots of shooting, violence of all kinds and police corruption make this a good fast read for those that enjoy these tales. By a black author but lots of racist comments that are unlikely to pass an editor today.

Almost on a par with the 87th Precinct. 4 stars but needs to be read as the late 1950's world, not as today.

[Liam · Rating 5 out of 5]

4.5*

[ΠανωςΚ · Rating 4 out of 5]

Σκέτη απόλαυση: σκληρό και βίαιο νουάρ, εξωφρενικό, πολύ-πολύ αστείο. Η επιρροή του, παρότι έχει γραφτεί εξήντα χρόνια πριν, φανερή, ειδικά στο σινεμά σε αστυνομικές ταινίες του 70, σε ταινίες τύπου Φονικό Όπλο αλλά και -κυρίως- στις ταινίες του Ταραντίνο.

[Oliver Clarke · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really pretty great.

[Andy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Probably the closest thing to a crime book written by Tex Avery - the eye popping, wolf howling mess explodes in your face like a cheap joke shop cigar.
It's 1950s Harlem and two afroid Frankenstein detectives try to solve why a white man died from a prop pistol gunshot. Coffin Ed and Grave Digger Jones scare even the toughest Dutch-Irish Eisenhower flatfoot cops and no stone is unturned.
Chester Himes has written the most insane crime novel ever written with his matinee idol looks and you should sell your soul to him or else Coffin Ed and Grave Digger will crush it in their voodoo-scarred claws.

[Malum · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not quite as funny or wonderfully weird as the first volume, but still a solid crime noir.

[Robert Morgan Fisher · Rating 5 out of 5]

For the first chapter alone, this pulp thrillah from yesterday is a wonderful read.

[Carla Remy · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this because it's in the Library of the Americas
Crime Novels of the 50s. And I'd read the other four books in that collection. So I bought this. I adore their Crime Novels of the 30s and 40s so much. Then I find out that this is the middle book of a trilogy. What the hell? Anyway it was super fast, which was cool. Different, fun, fly by speed.

[Jim Dooley · Rating 4 out of 5]

I very seriously doubt that THE REAL COOL KILLERS is a book that would be written today. Even maverick filmmaker, Quentin Tarantino, might find it to be too stringent for “optioning.” It’s not that it is simply “politically incorrect.” It would be the recipient of enraged criticism, even though it is set in era far removed from protest marches against racial injustice.

I had first heard of the writer, Chester Himes, in a Great Courses Plus series of lectures about the history of the mystery genre and the detective novel. Himes had been in prison, and eventually moved from the United States to live in Paris. There, among the many books he wrote, he created a series of crime novels set in Harlem ... not a frequently used location for mystery fiction. Himes wanted to reveal a culture that was located in one of the world’s largest cities, but that was not really understood by those living outside of it.

In A RAGE IN HARLEM, he brought to life the characters of police detectives Coffin Ed Johnson and Grave Digger Jones, black members of a mostly white police force who have insights into the Harlem community not shared by their fellow officers. They are also a ruthless law unto themselves. That is especially apparent in the second novel featuring them, THE REAL COOL KILLERS.

For about the first third of the book, there are crimes of passion committed, but there doesn’t appear to be any mystery at all. Soon though, the Reader is following the key members of a teenage street gang who kidnap a young fugitive from an arrest. Saying much more would lead to Spoilers. However, it is safe to say that as little bits of information increase to a veritable flood, an unexpected and intriguing mystery arrives, resulting in a climax that I suspected and a resolution that I didn’t see coming at all. THE REAL COOL KILLERS may have seemed like a hard-edged “slice of life” novel at the beginning, but it races to an intriguing and satisfying conclusion.

In the early 1970’s, Coffin Ed Johnson and Grave Digger Jones were highly sanitized for edgy appearances in the movies. Still, as enjoyable as those films may be, they in no way prepare the Reader for encountering the characters in these first two books. It is quite an unexpected trip.

[Greg · Rating 4 out of 5]

This gang of "Real Cool Moslem" toughs (young black men in disguises) probably won't appear in any 21st century literature. "Literature," you ask?" You're darn dootin' right: this is a beauty of brutality and mayhem from 1956. And it's a one-sit read.
BOOK 38: Mid-20th Century American Crime Readathon
HOOK=3 stars: A standard knife barfight opens the story.
PACE=5: Blistering. Not a word wasted.
PLOT=4: Pimps rent out their goods for S/M sessions. It's been done, certainly, but seldom this vicious and painful.
PEOPLE=5: We have Harlem Detectives Ed Johnson and Digger Jones. And the "Real Cool Moslems". And Sugartit. And Sonny. And Granny just mending socks. And the guy hunting for his arm. And more.
PLACE=5: Harlem in 1959. Something tells me the author knows it, has lived it, and gets it right.
SUMMARY: This is "Sledgehammer Noir", for an overall rating of 4.4. We do have a double-standard here: this black author tells a story only he can tell and get away with. A white writer would have been driven out of town. Then again, a white writer wouldn't have been able, I don't think, to get this experience on paper. This is a brutal read and it is the very darkest of noir, if that's what you're looking for.

[Arantxa Rufo · Rating 4 out of 5]

4⭐
Violencia gratuita, racismo, pobreza, prostitución, drogas y un barrio entero sin esperanza. Si la novela negra debe ser una crítica social, Chester Himes es el mejor en ello. Las historias de esta pareja de detectives son tan crudas como el Harlem en el que se localizan, y es un barrio que el lector llega a recorrer y oler y odiar como si estuviera allí mismo, gracias a una magnífica ambientación y la obra maestra que lleva a cabo Himes con el lenguaje.

👍 El lenguaje o, más bien, los lenguajes.
👍 La mejor ambientación que se puede narrar.
👍 El misterio de la bala asesina. Oye, que parece un tema secundario pero me tuvo en vilo y apuntando a sospechosos toda la novela.
👍 El sentido del humor.

👎 A estas alturas ya deberíamos haber profundizado más en la pareja protagonista

[Harold · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another good one from Chester Himes. Everything I said in my review of "A Rage In Harlem" holds true for this one. When reading books from a series there's little point to writing the same review over and over - unless something outstanding occurs. That holds especially true for me because I try not to reveal any plot details for concern of in some way dropping a spoiler. I've even read blurbs that I've thought reveal too much. Suffice it to say Himes is a fine writer and I'll be reading more of him.

[Rubén Vilaplana · Rating 4 out of 5]

Una serie que comencé a leer hace un par de años, este es el segundo volumen de nuestros dos protagonistas, policías negros en Harlem, un caso más que resolver, donde nos encontramos con partes bastante truculentas y otras divertidas, es curioso en este tipo de genero. Recomendada a todos aquellos amantes de la novela negra.

[Bill · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Real Cool Killers is the 2nd book in the Harlem Cycle, featuring Harlem police detectives, Coffin Ed and Grave Digger Jones, by Chester Himes. I have to say, lots of action in this story. Some of Himes' books have been turned into movies, including the 6th book in this series, Cotton Comes to Harlem.

The book definitely starts off with a bang. At the Dew Drop Inn in Harlem, the folks are having a grand time, dancing to the music, singing along. In the middle of this group is a large white man, just standing there, enjoying the scene. He appears to be a Cola distributor. Suddenly, a skinny Negro man approaches him brandishing a knife and threatening him. This starts an amazing violent chain of events. The white man is slashed with the knife and runs out. The bartender grabs the man with the knife and is slashed for his efforts and then he lops off the knife wielder's arm with an ax. Whew!

In the meantime, the white man is now being chased down the street by another man, high on marijuana, brandishing a pistol. The crowd follows along. Sitting on an outside staircase are a group of teenage boys, all garbed as Arabs, the Real Cool Moslems, and they also take off after people chasing the white man. A call is put into the police precinct warning of the events taking place.

Cotton Ed and Grave Digger Jones now make their appearance. Driving on patrol, the hear the police call out and head to the scene. By this time, the white man has been shot, and the duo discover that he is dead. They hand cuff the young man with the gun, Sonny and then are harassed by the Real Cool Moslems led by the Sheikh. One of them farts at the two cops and then another tosses a liquid in the face of Cotton Ed. It seems that Cotton had previously had acid thrown in his face, so he reacts instinctively and angrily and shoots the young man... dead.

Whew, I repeat. So after this beginning, Ed is sent home and Grave Digger begins his investigation. As well, the whole precinct is working door to door trying to find Sonny and the Moslems. The story moves from Grave Digger, to the other police to the Sheikh and his group, who have Sonny with them. The story moves along at a brisk pace and there is plenty of action as Grave Digger follows his own way of gathering information. It's all very interesting and action filled. Himes paints a colorful, fascinating portrait of the people and area. It's dark and gritty but also full of life. I have enjoyed the 1st two books and #3 is on order. (3.5 stars)

[Marc Gerstein · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book.the second in Chester Himes’ Harlem Cycle (following A Rage In Harlem) is another winner. It’s not as crazy as the first book, but it’s a page turner, especially beyond the halfway point. It all starts when a well-to-do white guy is chased out of a. Harlem bar and eventually killed. What was he chased? Why was he even there? Who killed him? And what’s up with the ever-present street gang known as the Real Cool Moslems? Easy obvious answers come quickly, especially when one black man is seen shooting in his direction just before he falls down dead. One problem: It turns out that was a starter’s pistol and couldn’t kill anybody. OK. Next theory. And so it goes as one straightforward answer after another falls apart. For the reader, trying to chase down the ultimate correct answer feels a lot like chasing a person who always eludes you just as it seems you finally caught up to him.

[Andy · Rating 5 out of 5]

I recognise I’m obsessed but I love Himes style. Jazzy, gritty, brutal and funny. Every book hits the spot.

[Adam · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was Chester Himes's second novel to feature his two tougher-than-leather Harlem police detectives, Coffin Ed Johnson and Grave Digger Jones. Actually, "tougher than leather" doesn't quite do this duo justice. Coffin Ed and Grave Digger are tougher than a leather bag full of nails, frozen in a block of ice, wrapped in another leather bag, and studded full of nails. If that sounds over-the-top, well, Himes meant these characters to be just that. His Harlem detective novels were written while he was living in France, on commission for his publisher, and Himes clearly had a lot of fun playing around with stereotypes. The Real Cool Killers and For Love of Imabelle (which was republished under the title A Rage in Harlem) are larger-than-life depictions of African American life in the '50s and '60s in Harlem. But there's a lot of truth in them, too. I love the way Himes is able to lampoon white folks' assumptions about black culture by having his black characters act the way the white characters in a given scene expect them to, ratchet up their buffoonery a few notches, and leave you laughing not only at their antics, but also at the white characters' idiocy for taking what they're seeing at face value. While his style is manic, violent, and wild, he's still a deeply human storyteller. I love his style of writing and his way of telling stories.

I didn't like The Real Cool Killers quite as much as I liked For Love of Imabelle, largely because my favorite character from that novel was murdered halfway through it, and no one in Himes's second novel quite has that character's charisma, humor, or entertaining mean streak. This is still a great novel, though, and one I highly recommend to all lovers of crime fiction and African American lit.

[Sarah Zama · Rating 4 out of 5]

The opening of the novel is one of the most puzzling and challenging I've ever read. Things happen and they seem absurd. People shout at each other, wound each other terribly, a man is shot to death, and there seems to be no reason for this.
But as the novel unfolds, reasons start to surface. By the end, we know there was nothing absurd in the opening scene, but everything happened for a reason. Reasons tightly entwined with human passions and twists.
For me, this is the most fascinating aspect of the novel.

I love Chester Himes. I love his visceral, powerful way to handle his characters, the way he drills reasons and passions inside them. The way they talk, the way they act. His characters always seem so real, they always act in response to inner desires and outside pushes, so that they seem real even when they act absurd - or seem to.

Still, this second novel set in Harlem it's not as powerful as the first one (`Rage in Harlem'). The action only spans a few hours, but while the investigation (lead by Grave Digger Jones) is tight, with a strong logic leading it, and with strong characters populating it, the parallel thread regarding the kids' gang is not as strong. The two threads meet at the end, but in the apartment where the kids hide nothing relevant seems to happen. The action meanders a little, there seems to be no real purpose but to take time while the investigation has its course. I didn't get bored because of Himes' incredible ability to create situations and his mastery in creating dialogue, but I did enjoyed the investigation more, and I did look forward to go back to Grave Digger when I was reading the kids.

In spite of this, I enjoyed it. A lot.