The John Franklin Bardin Omnibus (Penguin Crime Fiction) [Mass Market Paperback]

John Franklin Bardin (Author), Julian Symons (Introduction)

Product Details

• Mass Market Paperback: 602 pages
• Publisher: Penguin (Non-Classics) (August 1, 1976)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0140041303
• ISBN-13: 978-0140041309
• Product Dimensions: 7.6 x 5 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,746,383 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Superlative, May 25, 2008

By 

Douglas J. Bassett (Philadelphia, PA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The John Franklin Bardin Omnibus (Paperback)

If you can find it, this is a very nice edition of Bardin's three key works: THE DEADLY PERCHERON, THE LAST OF PHILLIP BANTER, DEVIL TAKE THE BLUE-TAILED FLY. Almost undescribable, Bardin is really about using popular frameworks of his day to explore areas of identity and character. DEADLY almost starts as something from "If" magazine or something, a lightweight fantasy, but gets very dark very quickly. My favorite of his, BANTER, is the closest thing I know of to Hitchcock on the page.

Bardin is an author that deserves more attention than he's gotten; to my mind he's easily the equal, if not the superior, to Woolrich. Certainly his books feel less slapdash than Woolrich's, more carefully thought out and crafted. Although I think Symons rather overrates it, BLUE TAILED FLY might be the definitive book of it's subgenre, the psychological thriller where one questions one's identity. (This is a theme that goest throughout Bardin's work, the fluidity of identity and the horror of it.)