Tough guy detective Mike Hammer is back from the grave, almost literally, for one last adventure. It begins with getting shot to pieces and left for dead at what was supposed to be a hit on the last of the big-time Mafia dons, arranged by one of the don's sons. After Hammer put a bullet in the face of the Kid-Who-Would-Be-Don, but before he enters what Hammer calls the "black alley," he is bundled into the back of a car by a once-alcoholic doctor who lost his license and is nursed back to a fragile health. Recuperating in isolation in Florida, doing a whole lot of nothing, Hammer is tracked down by NYPD Homicide Captain Pat Chambers, telling him that their old Army buddy, Marcos Dooley, has been shot, hasn't much longer, and is asking for him. What got Hammer back into action, and put old Dooley in a grave, was some missing Mafia money, to the tune of $89 Billion. Yep, Billion with a "B." It's not exactly chump change, except to the American government, but even Uncle Sugar's "money mice" want to sink their teeth into this boodle. Of course, everyone thinks Dooley's private dying declaration to Hammer was the location of this trove. The problem? He didn't tell Hammer where it was, only what it was.Mike Hammer first burst on the scene in 1947 in the unforgettable "I, the Jury." And, yes, that means that the war Hammer, Dooley and Chambers fought in was the Big War, the Good War, the war in which the Greatest Generation saved the hashtag Millennials from having to learn German or Japanese...yes, by this time (1996) Mike Hammer is an old geezer, no matter how you look at it. And though he's recuperating, he's still shot to hell...with everyone looking to add to the bullet count. However, he has one thing going for him that no one can take away...he's still Mike Hammer. It's one thing to be a tough guy when you're 25, but quite another when you're a septuagenarian. Mike is fully conscious of the reputation he has built over the past half-century, and he uses as a weapon. He carries a gun ("He always carries that gun," Don Lorenzo Ponti shouts down to his men at one point in the story. "If you think you can take it away from him without getting shot to pieces, go ahead, otherwise send him up.") but rarely does he actually have to draw it. It seems everyone knows somebody who thought he was tougher than Hammer, but wasn't. If they knew how close he was to entering the black alley, maybe they might have taken a chance...maybe not.By the end of the story, the reader has been to the grave and back with Mike Hammer, has seen both what he can do and what he doesn't have to do. An astute reader will learn that being a tough guy has little to do with being either tough or a guy, that you make yourself tough by going against the grain, and that ultimately you make yourself by what you do, not what you say. A true tough guy like Mike Hammer need not always drawn his weapon, merely let some punk see it, or just give him...the look. Tough guys may get old, but not soft.
This is book 13 of the Mike Hammer series & the last one that Spillane did before he died, I believe. (Max Allan Collins has finished up a few more from Spillane's notes.) Unfortunately, it sucked. Mind you, I don't expect a lot out of Mike Hammer novels. They're ego-fests, first person shoot 'em ups with everyone realizing just how tough, smart, & wonderful Mike Hammer is. That's a pretty big anchor for any story to wear, but Spillane's brutal verbiage & a huge suspension of belief on my part usually manage to make it a fairly enjoyable read. Not this time.Spillane's plots have always relied on a lot of coincidence & luck. They're also fairly predictable. This story wasn't any different in those respects, just the amount of holes Spillane left & had to fill, especially at the end. Worse, the overall plot was one he’s done before & much better in a short story. (view spoiler)[That the mob has a major money stash is OK. That one family would allow some trusted, smart retainer with sole guardianship is rough, but I can go along. That the 5 families gave it all to a handyman they didn’t really like or respect?! Who is in the employ of one Don?!!! (hide spoiler)]
What do You think about Black Alley (1996)?
I picked up this Spillane title at random, through the luck of the draw—i.e., what was on the library shelves—just to get a taste for the work. Just because Spillane was admired by Ayn Rand doesn't mean he's should be overlooked. But it turns out that there are better practitioners of gritty crime fiction from mid-century: Spillane can't match up to Thompson, Chandler, John D. MacDonald, Richard Price.Black Alley is a late work, at a time of life for Spillane's hero Mike Hammer that he's ready to settle down and marry his secretary Velda. Despite the late publication date (1996) and a reference to the 1993 WTC bombing, Spillane seems trapped in the late 1950s, with diction that is demure by today's standards ("horse manure," "teed off," "the stuff hit the fan"). His sentence structure is brutally simple, his plotting arrow-straight. There's no possibility that we don't know who killed Hammer's buddy and will fight the final showdown in the book's closing pages.Name brand references clank like the worst possible movie product placement.
—David
I haven't been in the "swing of things" for a while with the "Hammer" series, but having read this book, I truly HAVE been missing out! What do you do when the Mob, the Cops, The FBI AND the IRS are after you for money that someone stole years ago could set you up for life...what would you do? Mike Hammer finds himself in JUST that situation when a shootout leaves him in Florida fighting for his life to prevent himself being framed for a Mob hit against one of the most powerful Dons in the East
—Metagion
The plot is predictable; the characters are transparent; and the final solution lacks the shocking explosion of the other Hammer novels. This, the last entry in the Hammer series, fails to rise to the level of the earlier books in any ways. It is clumsily updated from the 50's feeling the first books had and now Mike Hammer, the toughest detective ever drinks Miller Lite, uses Sweet-N-Low, takes frequent naps and, perhaps, worst, plans to marry Velda (who must now be about 75 years old). Even though it has much of the trademark writing and there's moments of what made this "good garbage" (as Mickey Spillane once called his writing) in the first place, it's ultimately not worth the read.
—Bill
