Created by Hamilton T. Caine
Pseudonym of Stephen Smoke
(1949–)
“Her spirits, as well as her tits and ass, were beginning to sag more than a little.”
— Caine tries to do Chandler in Hollywood Heroes.
ACE CARPENTER is a Southern California P. I. created by Hamilton T. Caine (actually Stephen Smoke, founder and editor of Mystery Magazine). In fact, Smoke worked out the character in a handful of short stories in that magazine, before making the jump to novels.
Ace’s debut, 1981’s Carpenter, Detective, was a finalist for the Best Paperback Original Shamus, and there was a solid sequel, Hollywood Heroes, that popped up five years later.
As I recall, I enjoyed the books, partcularly the first one. I thought they were pretty good solid P.I. fare, full of Chandleresque patter, and they certainly deserved far better than Living to Die, a criminally inept 1991 B-flick starring (and directed by) Wings Hauser.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Not that Living to Die apparently slowed down author Hamilton T. Caine (an obvious pseudonym of Stephen Smoke, which also sounds like a pseudonym). He’s become something of a Shamus Game renaissance man, with his fingers in an awful lot of pies. He’s a musician and songwriter, author of over thirty books, including the New Agey, hard-boiled P.I. series featuring Nick Sands, and a filmmaker/multi-media artist. Besides founding the short-lived Mystery Magazine, he published one of the first online mystery magazines, Hamilton Caine’s Mystery Digest, on CompuServe way back in 1984.
NOVELS
- Carpenter, Detective (1981) | Buy this book
- Hollywood Heroes (1986) | Buy this book
SHORT STORIES
- “The Case of the Empty Fortune Cookies” (May 1981, Mystery Magazine)
FILM
- LIVING TO DIE | Buy this DVD
(1991, Trinity)
85 mins
Based on characters created by Stephen Smoke
Screenplay by Stephen Smoke
Directed by Wings Hauser
Produced by Richard Pepin, Joseph Merh
Starring Wings Hauser as NICK CARPENTER (“Ace” in the books)
Also starring Darcy de Moss, Asher Brauner, R.J. Walker, Rebecca Barrington, Janice Carter, Carol Hooper, Denise Lash, Charla Driver, Wendy McDonald, Arnold Vosloo, Minnie Madden, Jonathan Ross, Raymond Martino, Cheryl Nishi, Jason Jaeger, Jim Williams
FURTHER INVESTIGATION
- Stephensmoke.com
The author’s official site.
Respectfully submitted by Kevin Burton Smith.
