So Nude, So Dead

May 11, 2015
McBain scholars and aficionados will welcome this reissue of the late MWA Grand Master’s first crime novel, originally published in 1952 under a pseudonym. Ray Stone, who was once a promising pianist but is now a heroin addict desperate for his next fix, awakens one morning to find the woman next to him, Eileen Chalmers, with two bullet holes in her belly. Though appalled by Eileen’s murder, Stone is more concerned with finding the 16 ounces of heroin that he knows is somewhere in their hotel room—or was, before he passed out. He spends the next frantic days alternately searching for the stash, trying to score a quick hit, and running from the mobsters—who eventually capture him and administer a brutal beating as they try to extract the location of the missing heroin. The book is crude, clearly the work of a beginner—McBain was 26 when it was published—giving little indication of the superb craftsman that he would later become.

May 1, 2015
Musical prodigy Ray Stone hasn't lived up to his potentialthen again, it's hard to play the piano when there's a monkey on your back. Ray wakes up in a strange bed with a good-looking girl, but, unfortunately, she's dead. Even worse, from Ray's perspective, the pound of pure heroin they'd been sampling is gone. A known dope fiend and the police's only suspect, he's soon on the run, desperate to find the real killer and clear his name. But how can you solve a mystery when you have the shakes? Long out of print, the first crime novel by the legendary McBain was originally published in 1952 as The Evil Sleep! under his legal name, Evan Hunter, then again in 1956 with this title and the pseudonym Richard Marsten. While this portrait of a junkie won't be mistaken for Trainspotting, in its time it would have been the kind of paperback fiction your mom warned you about. The cover and the title are among its best attributes, but, still, a fun find for fans of McBain.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2015, American Library Association.)