Rave Reviews
for MAX PHILLIPS!
“A rip-roaring page-turner.”
—New York Newsday
“Snappy dialogue, caustic characterizations, hot descriptive passages.”
—Esquire
“A graphic satire of bedroom mores.”
—The New Yorker
“Deft satiric wit.”
—The New York Times Book Review
“Masterfully told... Phillips keeps it compelling to the end.”
—The Seattle Times
“Irresistible.”
—J.D. Landis, author of Longing
“Inventive, vividly written... highly entertaining.”
—Kirkus Reviews
High Praise for
‘FADE to BLONDE’!
“Sharp, savvy, and unapologetically raunchy... this taut, hard novel is a winner.”
—January Magazine
“A dark, dangerous style.”
—The New York Times Sunday Magazine
“A sleek ride... note-perfect noir.”
—The Haddon Herald
“It’s been said that Fade to Blonde could have been a Gold Medal novel. It certainly could have. It’s easily one of the best books I’ve read this year.”
—James Reasoner
“A smash from beginning to end.”
—Pop Thought
“Sure to thrill... They do write ’em like they used to.”
—Publishers Weekly
The one with the big watch put a hand on my chest, and I stopped and looked down at it.
“That’s a mistake,” I said. “Undo it.”
“We need to talk a minute, Mr. Rose,” he said.
“You don’t look like much of a conversationalist. Take that hand away.”
“Listen, friend,” he said. “We need to talk about how you talk to people.”
Maybe it’s because I was such a lousy boxer, but I don’t see the point of going move and countermove with people who ought to know the moves as well as you do. What I’d rather do is upset the board. I gave out a sort of groan and began to sit down, as if I were tired or having an attack, and without thinking the pug tried to pull me back up again by the tie. All two hundred forty-odd pounds of me, one-handed. I almost felt sorry for him. But I came up again fast, grabbing the back of his neck as I went, and broke his nose with my forehead. The pug fell back clutching his face and screaming way back in his throat, and his buddy moved in, but glancing over at his friend instead of tending to business, and I kicked out sideways and broke the buddy’s knee. That would have settled me for a while, but he looked like he wanted to get up again somehow, and I kicked him in the belly, which made him more introspective. By this time the first guy had gotten out his gun and lit off a couple, clutching his face and firing half-blind...
SOME OTHER HARD CASE CRIME BOOKS
YOU WILL ENJOY:
MONEY SHOT by Christa Faust
ZERO COOL by John Lange
SHOOTING STAR/SPIDERWEB by Robert Bloch
THE MURDERER VINE by Shepard Rifkin
SOMEBODY OWES ME MONEY by Donald E. Westlake
NO HOUSE LIMIT by Steve Fisher
BABY MOLL by John Farris
THE MAX by Ken Bruen and Jason Starr
THE FIRST QUARRY by Max Allan Collins
GUN WORK by David J. Schow
FIFTY-TO-ONE by Charles Ardai
KILLING CASTRO by Lawrence Block
THE DEAD MAN’S BROTHER by Roger Zelazny
THE CUTIE by Donald E. Westlake
HOUSE DICK by E. Howard Hunt
CASINO MOON by Peter Blauner
FAKE I.D. by Jason Starr
PASSPORT TO PERIL by Robert B. Parker
STOP THIS MAN! by Peter Rabe
LOSERS LIVE LONGER by Russell Atwood
HONEY IN HIS MOUTH by Lester Dent
QUARRY IN THE MIDDLE by Max Allan Collins
THE CORPSE WORE PASTIES by Jonny Porkpie
Fade to
BLONDE
by Max Phillips
A HARD CASE CRIME BOOK
(HCC-002)
First Hard Case Crime edition: September 2004
Copyright © 2004 by Max Phillips
Cover painting copyright © 2004 by Gregory Manchess
All rights reserved.
For K, the most dangerous blonde of all
1
Blue Convertible
Well, maybe she wasn’t all that blonde, but it’d be a crime to call hair like that light brown. It was more sort of lion-colored. Lioness. It was heavy, shiny hair, and it fell straight down to her shoulders from a central part. She hadn’t done much to it. She didn’t have to. She got out of the big Studebaker convertible and walked across the red dirt where someday there was supposed to be a front lawn. I was up on the roof, laying tile for one of those little hacienda-looking breadboxes. The whole street was full of them, all half-built. She wore a pale blue dress with cream piping, a dark blue belt, and a silly little schoolgirlish collar. She had nice straight shoulders. There was nothing wrong between them and her open-toed shoes, so I guess the trouble must have been somewhere behind those blue-gray eyes. There’d be trouble, of course. She looked up and called, “Is your name Corson?”
I said it was.
“Are you busy?”
I didn’t think she could be an actual movie star. She didn’t walk right, and she was too thin for the work, with two notable exceptions. She looked up at me, shading her eyes. “I’d like to talk to you.”
“You are,” I said.
“I might have some work for you.”
“What kind?”
She just stood there, looking up at me. “Well, you’re big enough,” she said at last.
I kept waiting.
“I hear you did some boxing,” she said.
I kept waiting.
“It looks like you got hit.”
“Not really,” I said. “I went nine and two. I broke the nose falling out of a tree in third grade. The rest of the face has just always been that way.”
I was annoyed with myself. No one needed to hear any of that.
“I still think you’ve been hit a few times,” she said, smiling faintly.
It was actually a pretty nice smile.
I walked over toward the carport to where the roof swooped down low, and sat myself down on the edge. She came and stood below me, between my feet. She was a tall one, all right.
“I’ve been hit a few times,” I said.
“Nine and two’s not bad. Why’d you stop?”
I shrugged. “They started to match me with guys who knew how to box. And it wasn’t what I came here to do.”