Five Shots and a Funeral [Mass Market Paperback]

Dashiell Loveless (Author), Tom Fassbender (Author), Jim Pascoe (Author), Paul Pope (Author)

Book Description

Series: Early Cases of Ben Drake | Publication Date: November 1999

Follow cigar-smoking, bourbon-drinking detective Ben Drake as he returns in this collection of murder-packed mystery capers. Includes "The Silent Ventriloquist," Death Plays a Foul Game," A Cold-Blooded Kidnapping," "Midnight Train to Nowhere," and the highly-anticipated case of "Raspberry Jack." Full-color cover and seven interior illustrations by Paul Pope.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

The second novel in Fassbender and Pascoe's (By the Balls) neo-noir crime series again features hard-hitting, quick-thinking PI Benjamin Drake. The new book presents five connected stories by fictional author Dashiell Loveless that explore the seamy underside of fictional Testacy City, Nev., where no one is above suspicion. In "The Silent Ventriloquist," Drake finds his client's missing ventriloquist husband only to learn that the missing party is really a faceless wooden dummy that channels the voice of its dead owner. In "Death Plays a Foul Game," Drake, smitten by the mysterious Beth Hrubi, goes undercover to a cockfight to rub elbows with Testacy City's most notorious underworld figures. And in "Raspberry Jack," Drake matches wits with a serial killer who marks his victims' foreheads with a lavender letter. The PI drives a powder-blue 1966 Galaxy 500, wears a Borsalino fedora, drinks Old Grand-Dad and is a sucker for a femme fatale. Dashiell Loveless, the "author" of these delightfully slick stories and a pulp artifact himself, exists in an ironic fiction-limbo that pays homage to the writing of Raymond Chandler and Dashiell Hammett, while Fassbender and Pascoe have a bit of literary fun on their own terms. The b&w cover and interior illustrations by noted comics artist Pope are crisply expressive, and the book's design, compact size and back cover crime scene diagram intentionally recall the pocket paperback mysteries of the 1940s. (May)
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Review

"... a genre-bending read for the fashion conscious." -- New Times Los Angeles, February 3, 2000

"...a sharp-as-a-knife parody and a loving tribute. It's the rare book that works as straight hard-boiled entertainment and as sly and clever satire. [Five Shots and a Funeral] does both in spades." -- January Magazine, February 2000

Meet cigar-smoking, bourbon-drinking detective Ben Drake in Five Shots And A Funeral, a hard-boiled, pulp fiction style collection of five murder-packed mystery capers. Included in this outstanding anthology are The Silent Ventriloquist; Death Plays a Foul Game; A Cold-Blooded Kidnapping; Midnight Train to Nowhere; and Raspberry Jack. Tom Fassbender and Jim Pascoe are good as they get in the murder mystery business -- and their energetic stories are enhanced with seven black and white, full page illustrations. -- Midwest Book Review, December 1999

Product Details

• Mass Market Paperback: 277 pages
• Publisher: Uglytown Productions; 1st edition (November 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0966347315
• ISBN-13: 978-0966347319
• Product Dimensions: 6.3 x 4.2 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 5.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,980,873 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #72 in Books > 4-for-3 Books > Mystery & Thrillers > Mystery > Anthologies

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars I can't get enough of this funky stuff, November 28, 2000

By 

Joe Wilmot (Maui, Hawaii) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Five Shots and a Funeral (Mass Market Paperback)

Why isn't there a animated series of this stuff on TV? The Uglytown guys have done it again, Five Shots and a Funeral is a fun ride through the dank and unsavory streets of Testacy City. When's the next book coming out???

0 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars For a certain type of mystery fan, April 26, 2000

By 

Harriet Klausner - See all my reviews
(#1 Hall OF FAME REVIEWER)    (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Five Shots and a Funeral (Mass Market Paperback)

This is a short story collection written by the fictional "pulp artifact" Dashiell Loveless. Each of the five-stories can stand-alone yet all of them interrelate as it follows the exploits of Testacy City, Nevada private investigator Benjamin Drake.

All five tales are entertaining and will remind the audience of the golden (more like black and white) days of the pulp fiction novel of the late 1930's-1940's. Drake is a wonderful character who is a throw back to those glory days of Marlowe and Spade. The authors (Tom Fassbender and Jim Pascoe) and the illustrator Paul Pope seem to have had fun paying homage while satirizing the mystery genre's legendary authors (such as Hammett) and their great detectives. Anyone who enjoys hard-boiled detective stories with a wink and a nod to the classics sleuths will want to also read the authors' previous book BY THE BALLS.

Harriet Klausner