Whitfield's first novel, and the one critics like best (Hammett loved it, but, then, Whitfield and Hammett were drinking buddies.) The story begins with Mal Ourney's release from a two-year prison sentence. While in prison Ourney apparently develops sympathy for the small-time crooks he meets, and hatches a plan to get the big guys when he gets out. Rumors of this spread outside the prison walls and he is a target for a frame-up within hours of his release.

Green ice (A Quill mysterious classic)

Raoul Whitfield

Mystery, Thriller & Suspense

Quill

Whitfield's first novel, and the one critics like best (Hammett loved it, but, then, Whitfield and Hammett were drinking buddies.)  The story begins with Mal Ourney's release from a two-year prison sentence. While in prison Ourney apparently develops sympathy for the small-time crooks he meets, and hatches a plan to get the big guys when he gets out. Rumors of this spread outside the prison walls and he is a target for a frame-up within hours of his release.

Green Ice (No Exit Press Vintage Crime)

Literature & Fiction

Poetry

No Exit Press

The maestro steps to the podium, a plane flies overhead, the stage lights go down, and when they come up moments later the conductor has been shot--murdered by unknown gunmen in front of twenty thousand witnesses on the stage of the Hollywood Bowl. And before the event, detective Ben Jardinn had been approached by two of the prime suspects, to prove their innocence. But, can he solve the murder when there is no one he can trust, not even the members of his own agency? In Death in a Bowl, Raoul Whitfield, drinking companion of Dashiell Hammett and fellow Black Mask author, gives us a story of greed and betrayal set against the backdrop of Hollywood in the late twenties.

Death in a Bowl

Mystery

The Virgin Kills

Ellery Queen wrote: "Whitfield is a much too neglected member of the Hammett-Chandler hardboiled school." Dashiell Hammett himself praised the Whitfield stories for their "naked action pounded into tough compactness by staccato, hammerlike writing." Previously announced but long delayed (as we searched for more stories) Jo Gar's Casebook is the first collection of Whitfield's extraordinary tales. 
In the February 1930 issue of Black Mask, a new character was introduced to the American detective story. Jo Gar was both a classic "thinking" sleuth and a tough man of action who inhabited an exotic noir world on the Philippines, facing a rogue's gallery of colorful villains from mixed-race Chinese to upper-crust American exiles. "The Little Island Detective" lived in a vivid world of pre-war Asia where typhoons threatened the harbor, criminals escaped from the local prison, and the waterfront was home to cut-throats from all countries. 
Throughout the 1930's, Raoul Whitfield was a star contributor to Black Mask – only Erle Stanley Gardner appeared more often. The cover and design are by neo-pulp artist Tom Roberts. 
Crippen &amp; Landru is pleased to work with Black Mask Press on this new series, Tales From the Black Mask Morgue, to bring to a new generation the best uncollected stories from the greatest of all hardboiled magazine. Future publications will include books by Norbert Davis, Paul Cain, Frederic Nebel, and others.

Jo Gar's Casebook (Tales from the Black Mask Morgue Series)

Black Mask Press / Crippen & Landru Publishers