Showing posts with label The Griffin. Show all posts
Showing posts with label The Griffin. Show all posts

Saturday, July 30, 2022

The Crime Master (Gordon Manning & The Griffin, Vol. 1) by J. Allan Dunn

Continuing my tour of story collections from the pulp era, I turned this time to The “Crime Master” otherwise known as the continuing battles of Gordon Manning & The Griffin.  The stories in this collection were originally published from 1929 through 1931 in “Detective Fiction Weekly” magazine and are presented in chronological order.

There were a total of 31 installments in this series and 11 are presented here in this first volume. Each tale builds on previous stories but, in essence, consists of The Griffin (The Crime Master himself) contacting Gordon Manning (formerly Secret Service and currently a consulting attorney) about which famous person he will soon assassinate.  The Griffin takes great pleasure in baiting Gordon, even including which 24 hour time frame his crime will be committed.  Despite Gordon’s best efforts at providing security for the target, the dastardly Griffin always manages to be one step ahead and gets away.  Often one of his henchmen is sacrificed and over these 11 stories, Gordon does make some progress in “getting close” but remains frustrated at the end of each story.

Each of the stories follows the same basic structure but there is enough variation to make each one interesting.  I chose to read one story between each novel I've been reading in order to keep them somewhat fresh. I am very interested to eventually read that last (number 31) story to see if Gordon finally nabs his man but for now, I will just have to hold my breath.

As I’ve expanded my intake of pulp stories from the 1920s-1950s I find myself appreciating them more and more.  The author of these stories, J. Allan Dunn seems to have led an extremely adventurous life himself and his biography would make an almost unbelievable story in its own right.  I rank his Crime Master stories among my favorite pulp reading experiences so far and I will be looking for Volume 2 in short order.