Created by William Dale
Pseudonym of Norman A. Daniels
Other pseudonyms Dorothy Daniels, Harrison Judd, Mark Reed, Norman T. Vane & David Wade, Daniella Dorsett, Angela Gray, Cynthia Kavanaugh, Suzanne Somers, Geraldine Thayer & Helen Gray Weston
Also used the house pseudonyms James Clayford, G. Wayman Jones & Robert Wallace
(1905-95)
“Hold tight, Loopy!” she squealed. “Mama’s coming!”
— Rita to the rescue!
“Big Apple eye LOOPY JONES had investigated many puzzling cases in his years as a private detective but this,” the inside blurb assures us, but The Terror of the Handless Corpse (1939) was “the screwiest of them all.”
Rye-slurping Loopy works (reluctantly) for the Ajax Information Agency, run by grumpy ol’ Del Skinner. He’s even more reluctant about working with fellow investigator, pistol-packing Rita, who seems to think he’s worth her time. All in all, he’d rather drink. He’s seriously considering quitting.
But then Skinner shows up, with a hot case, and both he and that blurb demand answers!
“What was the connection between the escape of two public enemies from seemingly escape-proof federal prisons and the faceless, handless corpse that may or may not have been Monte Maroni, “reformed” gang leader? What link bound Maroni to a multi-millionaire and an eminent scientist? What was the secret of the missing hands, severed from the bodies of murdered men? And above all, was there any connection between these strange happenings and the crime which had shocked the nation five years before–the unsolved Vanderlaugh kidnapping case?”
This one is pure pulp, completely bonkers at times, top heavy with (occasionally incomprehensible) slang and attempts on poor Loopy’s life, and dashed with a spritz of humour.
At least I think it’s humour. It might just be bad writing. Sometimes it’s hard to tell. I remember being completely confused by a lot of it.
THE BLURB
- “Fast-moving, puzzling, this entirely unorthodox story about an entirely unorthodox detective is recommended for the reader who likes his mysteries new and not cut from the old tried and true pattern. This is a unique, baffling tale, strung on a thread of spine-chilling horror.”
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
William Dale (actually Norman A. Daniels) was a prolific writer for the pulps, creating The Black Bat, and was regularly published in The Phantom Detective and The Shadow. He later wrote for the burgeoning paperback market, as well as for radio and television. Throughout his career, he used a multitude of pen names, and occasionally collaborated with his wife, Dorothy Daniels.
NOVELS
- The Terror of the Headless Corpse (1939; aka “Corpse, Hands Off!”) | Buy this book
Respectfully submitted by Kevin Burton Smith.
