Salacious heavy-metal pulp, bubbling over with post-teenage tension and pseudo-intense grooves. It's a keeper, a B+ collection that will whet your appetite for more. C'mon pretty baby, kiss me deadly!

The Long Wait is not a part of Mickey Spillane's classic and infamous Mike Hammer series. Instead, its the story of an amnesiac who invades a corrupt small town in order to avenge the death of a friend. Unsure of who he even is, our "hero" finds himself trapped in a brutal world of violent criminals, evil rich men, and sexy femme fatales -- in short, every classic element of pulp fiction is included in this often ludicrous yet strangely intriguing book. Obviously, anyone who begins a Spillane novel looking for a cohesive, logical plot is already starting off on the wrong foot. However, the plot of the Long Wait defies any and all logic even by Spillane's standards. However, Spillane so credibly creates this absurd world of his that only the most analytical of readers couldn't be swept up into it. Make no mistake about it, this is not a book written for "our time." The violence is brutal, the portrayal of women is defiantly sexist, and we never forget that our hero is really a bit of a jerk. And, though it might not be fashionable to admit, there's a great release to reading Spillane's delightfully amoral prose. He might not be describing a life we'd ever chose to live but that doesn't mean his world isn't occasionally fun to visit.

Even amongst afficianados of pulp fiction, Mickey Spillane doesn't ever quite seem to get all the credit that's due to him. Maybe its because, unlike Raymond Chandler, academia has never embraced him. Unlike Dashiell Hammett, Spillane has never had any pretensions beyond being a pulp writer. Along with a healthy dose of unfashionable right-wing politics, most of Spillane's books carry an undercurrent of casual sadism. Whereas most pulp heroes did what they had to do in order to survive in a newly cynical, postwar world, Spillane's heroes always seemed to be violent for the sake of being violent. Spillane once bragged that he wrote most of his books in two days and never wasted any time with second drafts. Certainly, the fractured, make-it-up-as-you-go-along-feel to the Long Wait would seem to validate that point. But for what Spillane sacrifices in craft, he makes up for in just sheer force. This book is a crazed, maniacal trip into the imagination of a very entertaining madman. This is a book with absolutely no socially redeeming value and in the end, we're all the better for it.

In the first three Mike Hammer novels, Mickey Spillane was learning as he went. Here he's pretty much hitting his stride, in novels 4, 5 and 6. These are the quintessential Hammer outings. Spillane has borrowed two basic plot devices from earlier genres. From silent serials he has borrowed "the weenie," as Pearl White called it... a missing item that all the characters are frantically searching for, and all the bad guys think the hero knows the wereabouts of. From the DOC SAVAGE pulp novels of Lester Dent he has borrowed the idea of a master criminal who somehow finds the time, in innocuous guise, to pal around helpfully with our hero in his quest to solve the mystery. The fun of each novel is in seeing how Spillane mixes these ingredients.

ONE LONELY NIGHT begins and ends on a deserted New York City bridge in a snowstorm. At the beginning, Hammer is involved in a murder and suicide. At the end, he kills the villain with his bare hands and leaves his cooling corpse to be covered in snow! In between, Hammer is mixed up with palpably evil Communist Party USA members and the agate-eyed NKVD killers who keep them in line. [The novel was written at the height of McCarthy-era paranoia.] Added to the mix are missing plans of the latest US secret weapon, and a universally loved political figure who says he's being blackmailed by his identical twin brother, an escaped lunatic! At the very end there's an amazing if implausible identity switch that is a variant of the one at the end of VENGEANCE IS MINE.

In THE BIG KILL, Hammer winds up having to care for a 1-year-old orphaned boy, while trying to solve the puzzle of who killed the boy's father, and why. Not only is the DA on Hammer's case big time, but kingpins of a city-wide gambling and vice racket seem extraordinarily nervous about who has possession of some unknown documents that the DA is desperate to obtain. You'd guess the identity of Hammer's secret adversary long before Hammer does, if the inside front cover blurb didn't give it away already! Action is nicely integrated by having almost all the novel's events occur during heavy rain showers.

Since Hammer is in all three novels engaged to marry his lovely assistant Velda, you'd think sex with strangers would take a back seat in these adventures, and to some extent it does, particularly in the last of the three novels, KISS ME, DEADLY, in which Hammer does little more than to gaze appreciatively at the hot babes he encounters. To make up for no sex, Spillane escalates the violence tremendously. I lost count of the number of Mafia goons that Hammer kills, usually with his bare hands, when opportunity presents. The goons return the favor by beating Hammer to a pulp at least twice, torturing one girl to death and getting a good start on doing the same to Velda! Oddly among Spillane's usually tightly constructed plots, there are some major loose ends at the end of KISS ME, DEADLY.

Every one of these is a classic. Spillane's novels hurtle along at a breathless pace... and they're addictive, as you'll see if you sample this great bargain of a collection.

I almost didn't read the whole book. The first story was pretty bad. But I decided to keep at it until I got to Nancy Picard's and Sharon McCrumb's stories. Two of my favorite authors. I'm glad I did, because the stories got progressively better. Not a great collection but fairly entertaining

This story has so many flaws, it's not worth listing them all. If you like your hard-boiled characters turning sensitive and up-scale, you may like this book. But Mike Hammer it isn't! The name's the same, but almost all of the details have changed for the worse.

Mike awakes from a coma to find he is recovering from a life-threatening wound. In a crazy and improbable tale, a surgeon turned drunk has picked him up and saved his life. The book's title refers to the temptation to take the black alley towards death. His recovery is cut short when an old army pal calls him back to his death bed, where Mike learns about a missing $89 billion that his friend has hidden. The search for the money is complicated by Mike's finally proposing to Velda, and her accepting.

To me, the whole injury recovery, the missing $89 billion, and the way Mike lives are all very dissatisfying.

What I loved about the book was the way that Mike keeps to his idealism when it comes to his love for Velda. No modern monkeyshines for him! That aspect of the book was the only one that rang true for me.

If you love Mike Hammer, you may want to skip this book. You won't feel the same about the character or the series if you read this book. If you have never read Mike Hammer, this book may seem a little less bad to you.

If you do decide to read the book, I suggest that you think about where you can uphold your standards in ways that will make your life and the lives of those around you better.

Be yourself . . . in a helpful way!

I was wondering when Spillane was going to bring Mike back, and then I saw it on the shelf at my local bookstore, just calling out at me. I picked it up and didn't even read the flap I knew it would be good. Well let me tell you I was not disappointed, as soon as I opened the cover I started reading, and could not put it down. I had to force myself to go to work, and eat. I love the way Spillane gave the new book, present surroundings, but he left Mike behind in the times. I mean really could you see Mike at a desk in front of a computer . No, not in a million years. If I was to write a mysery I would want it to be like Spillane's Mike Hammer Books. Cause as they say he not only always gets his man, and he does so cool and smooth. That's it in a nutshell, why I like Mike Hammer, his style, and finess. I wanna be like Mike

I have never read a Mike Hammer book that I did not like and "The Black Alley" is no exception. Mike is mellowed, but only a little, as he returns from the (almost) dead to right the wrongs, fight the bad guys, and love the girls in the style that only Spillane can create. This is another one of the Mike Hammer books that you just cannot lay down.

I'm not sure if this book was written before or after Spillane became a Jehovah's Witness, but this book seems a bit toned down. Violence is still here, but the sex is all but gone. This book is pretty good though. There were various bits I liked about this book. Very hard-boiled. The mystery is still intriguing, but it's the cheap way that our detective solves the mystery in the last chapter that flaws this book.

This was the second Mike Hammer book I picked up (the first being "Kiss Me, Deadly"), and it got me hooked into the series. Spillane's classic descriptions of New York and great lines are all present. Like most Hammer books, the ending seems to come too abruptly, but that is my only complaint. A lesser book than "I, the Jury" and "My Gun is Quick", it is still a strong entry.

Private Detective Mike Hammer meets and befriends a prostitute known as 'Red'. The next day Hammer finds that 'Red' has been killed in a hit and run. He's convinced that it was no accident but murder, and vows revenge against those responsible.
'My Gun Is Quick' finds Mickey Spillane in a rut. Once again a friend of Mike Hammer's has been killed and once again the private detective is out for revenge. In 'I, the Jury' it was a wartime buddy, in 'Vengeance Is Mine' it was another friend, in 'The Big Kill' it was an orphaned child's father, and now in 'My Gun Is Quick' it is a hooker with a heart of gold.
Spillane was just going through the motions in this one. Half-way through the book you will already be able to guess the ending if you've ever read any other Mike Hammer book.

a lot of people have been saying how "hardboiled" mickey spillane is.

i suppose that's fair to say.

a lot of people have been saying that he's trash.

that too is accurate.

spillane is hard to describe. he can make a good plot outline and occasionally some decent diolauge, but most of the time it kind of just walks from one point to another, and predictably, too. the whole thing is like an inept chandler homage, but spillane deserves credit because the book at least can evoke memories of chandler. i guess it's good for a look, but really it's just kind of a book one would buy at an airport, read, then throw away.

This book was exciting, moved fast, and Spillane's character, Mike Hammer, as always, was in top form. Spillane's stories are always suspenseful and exciting.

Private Dick Mike Hammer is on the case of the murder of a safe cracker who left behind an orphan. Hammer shows his softer side by adopting the boy and is rewarded for this altruism in the end. In his search for the killer Hammer enlists the aid of a beautiful blonde, a beautiful brunette, kills several people, butts heads with the DA, beats up others and is in turn beaten up.
Hammer is a detective, who is very ruthless, stubborn, always sleeps well after sending someone to the mourgue, and unlike Phillip Marlowe, gets to sleep with all the girls..