Black Alley

Times have changed, and Mickey Spillane's tough-guy private eye, Mike Hammer, has changed with them. Well, sort of. Hammer confesses to his fondness for Wagner in this latest adventure and proposes to his long-time gal Friday, the voluptuous Velda. He even dines at Le Cirque, though thankfully he does not order quiche. Meanwhile, he is tracking down a missing $89 billion while dodging the mob, the Feds, the cops, and a shadowy set of very nasty villains. Spillane's fondness for hard-boiled imagery, and his devotion to Raymond Chandler's maxim "When in doubt, have a guy come through a door with a gun," have not wavered. Hammer hits the big time in this delightfully preposterous pulp fiction.