Customer Reviews

Even The Wicked

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This book was written in the mid-50s and takes place, for the most part, on Martha's Vineyard. A tightly written crime novel, it is interesting for its Vineyard scenery at a time years before the island was the tourist mecca that it is now. A lot of fun for those familiar with the place today. There's a lot more to McBain than the 87th Precinct books.

"Zach Blake",with his young daughter "Penny"returns to Martha's Vineyard where a year earlier his wife had drowned.He is drawn back to the island by a letter from a Native American woman "Evelyn Cloud"who claims to have proof that the death was not,as originally believed,an accident but murder. She denies having sent such a letter and soon afterwards she herself is found murdered.Suspicion momentarilly falls on "Zach"but he is soon cleared.

His daughter is then kidnapped and he is warned to leave the island within 24 hours or she will be killed

The novel deals with the efforts of "Zach"and his ally local newspaperwoman "Enid"to get to the bottom of things, the resolution sees them involved in the worlds of drug smuggling and the high society pastime of yachting before the neat and plausible resolution of the story

Written when he was a younger and hungrier writer than today this is machine tooled efficiency from as pulp pro. Dig out a copy-you are unlikely to regret it