Shell Scott's Seven Slaughters

Shell Scott #23

by Richard S. Prather

PAPERBACK ORIGINAL FIRST EDITION, Fawcett Gold Medal #k1287, 1961. Paperback first edition, so stated, no previous hardcover. Book #23 in the Shell Scott Mystery series, a seven story anthology. Cover “A rousing collection of sensational stories about Shell Scott - America’s most wanted Private Eye!” Original 40 cover price. Paperback, 160 pages, 18 cm.

160 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1961

About the author

Richard Scott Prather was an American mystery novelist, best known for creating the "Shell Scott" series. He also wrote under the pseudonyms David Knight and Douglas Ring.

Prather was born in Santa Ana, California. He served in the United States Merchant Marine during World War II. In 1945 year he married Tina Hager and began working as a civilian chief clerk of surplus property at March Air Force Base in Riverside, California. He left that job to become a full-time writer in 1949. The first Shell Scott mystery, 'Case of the Vanishing Beauty' was published in 1950. It would be the start of a long series that numbered more than three dozen titles featuring the Shell Scott character.

Prather had a disagreement with his publisher in the 1970s and sued them in 1975. He gave up writing for several years and grew avocados. However in 1986 he returned with 'The Amber Effect'. Prather's final book, 'Shellshock', was published in hardcover in 1987 by Tor Books.

At the time of his death in 2007, he had completed his final Shell Scott Mystery novel, 'The Death Gods'. It was published October 2011 by Pendleton Artists.

Prather served twice on the Board of Directors of the Mystery Writers of America. Additionally Prather received the Shamus Award, "The Eye" (Lifetime achievment award) in 1986.

Reviews

[Dave · Rating 4 out of 5]

Seven Slaughters is the third of four volumes collecting all of Prather’s short Shell Scott fiction, which had previously appeared in Manhunt, Cavalier, and other magazines.

1) The Best Motive (orig in Manhunt 1957) Set entirely in Laguna Beach, this one has Scott riding to the rescue of poor little rich girl Ellen, whose parents and first husband all met tragic ends, only now to be stalked by crazy Bruno.

2) Crime of Passion orig in Manhunt Dec 1954) is a rather short piece both in timeline and scope. Set in Malibu, Crime of Passion has Scott attending a wild and crazy Hawaiian Luau. The mystery is solved so quickly here though the reader barely has time to even wonder who done it.

3) Squeeze play (orig in Manhunt Oct 1953) Set in Los Angeles, this one has Shell accosted at his office while feeding his tropical fish by Pretty Willis, whose boss Hackman wants a conference with Shell. Shell has a client this time, Ann, who is worried about her missing husband, Hackman’s accountant.

4) Butcher (orig inManhunt 1954) Set in the Elysian Park neighborhood of Los Angeles, this story starts with a mangy dog finding a human leg and then proceeds from there. Scott died by have a client, but he knows the butchered girl and her sister.

5) Babes, Bodies, and Bullets ( orig in Cavalier April 1958) -where Scott has a real client, a Mrs. Hamilton who is worried about her industrialist husband. Scott has to tangle with hoods like Noodles, Frank the Mouse, and Lou Finney.

6) The Double Take (orig in Manhunt July 1953) in which Hazel the switchboard operator, one of the few recurring characters in Shell Scott stories, actually has a line of dialogue. This is also a story where Scott gets shot at in Pete’s Bar en route to meet a client at the Hollywood Roosevelt. This is one though where not everything is at seems.

7) Film Strip (orig in Ed McBain January 1960) where Scott tests out his new camera on a deserted beach in Laguna, his subject, the curvaceous Robbie starts doing a striptease with her bikini and Scott is distracted by a guy getting pushed off a cliff.

[SB · Rating 3 out of 5]

My first of the two Scott anthology novels. Definitely felt more like sketches/outlines of stories rather than real short stories. Like he’d say stuff pretty close to “I spent the next three days getting into a lot of interesting adventures but ultimately they turned up dead ends until day 4.” Still, fun harmless stuff.

Best Motive: Dude wants to kill his new wife so he tricks her stalker into being in the same vacation town he plans on killing her it. Cool club scene where everything’s blacklit and the waiters (and two hired killers) wear skeleton costumes.

Crime of Passion: Rich old dude keeps throwing pool parties for hot youngsters. Wife gets tired of it, catches him cheating, knocks him on the head, and skewers him on the pig poke and turns on the first. One of the most gruesome scenes I’ve read in this series. Scott finds the body and smokes out the killer by pretending to eat a sandwich made from the “pig” meat. This all takes place in 7 pages.

Squeeze Play: Shell vs a vain killer called Pretty. He un-pretties him. Also involved is a mob accountant trying to blackmail his boss. It ends with a violent shootout in front of city hall.

Butcher: Scott tracks down a serial killer who dismembers the victims that the cops call Butcher. It coincidentally is one of the victim’s real butchers. Or, actually, it’s the butcher’s wife. The most route of the collection.

Babes, Bodies, and Bullets: The longest and probably the best of the batch. About 30%+ of the book. Shell vs crime dude who was knocking off innocent-ish lawyers and investors who were muscling in on his profit.

The Double Take: Actually, this was the best of the batch. A rogue conman group impersonates Scott to pull off various scams. Does he get pissed and even? Of course he does.

Film Strip: Scott’s on the beach filming his date naked and accidentally films a murder. The murderer spends time trying to kill Scott, and Scott decides to pretend to show the footage (which was actually destroyed) at a movie palace to the public to get the guy to show up. Guy gets the drop on Shell, but his date does another strip tease that drives the murderer temporarily insane to Scott can get him.

Started reading this as we landed in Cancun on Friday. Read almost all of it Friday afternoon in the pool. Finished it Saturday morning.

[Jiří Pavlovský · Rating 3 out of 5]

Jak už název napovídá, jedná se o povídkový sborník, o sedm případů soukromého detektiva, který věnuje stejné úsilí vyšetřování případů i barvitému popisování ženských půvabů. A má tedy co popisovat, každá žena, na kterou narazí, je splnění všech mužských snů… tedy, kromě těch, co už jsou staré a jedné, která je v textu definovaná jako „normální žena“, tudíž nestojící za podrobnější popis.

Samotné příběhy zrovna neoslní brilantními nápady, spíš zaujmou autorovou hravostí a nadhledem. Z těch nápaditějších je tady příběh, ve kterém Shell Scott má dorazit v přesnou hodinu na schůzku s klientem, jenže to nestihne. Nebo povídka, ve které jde prostě jen na večírek a má problémy dostat se přes hlavní vchod. Spíš než o zápletky tu ale jde o lehkost, s jakou to autor popisuje, živé dialogy a občasné fajn nápady. Kupříkladu, když jde fotit svou momentální přítelkyni na pláž, ona se rozhodne předvést striptýz… a přitom si Scott všimne, že za jejími zády, na vrcholu útesu, dochází ke střetu mezi dvěma muži. A hrdina stejně důsledně a zároveň popisuje jak striptýz, tak vraždu na útesu, jak dvě simultánní události stejného významu, a teprve když dopadne tělo, převáží detektivní část osobnosti nad tou nadrženou (což si samozřejmě hrdina vyčítá a má z toho trauma).

A ano, i když se tu často mlátí lidi pažbou pistole za ucho, tak Prather dává daleko větší důraz na akci než bývá v žánru obvyklé. Většina toho jsou klasické popisy rvaček, ale dojde i na souboj s využitím řetězů.

Je to ryzí pulp toho nejčistščího střihu, ovšem člověk má u něj pocit, že si to děsně užívá nejen hrdina, ale i autor. A následkem toho i čtenář.

[Pat · Rating 3 out of 5]

fairly enjoyable

Until we got into the sleepy ‘turn’ then I went down hill fast. Too bad. Just not my cup of tea I guess.