The Long Wait [Hardcover]

Mickey Spillane (Author)

Product Details

• Hardcover: 188 pages
• Publisher: Amereon Limited (January 1920)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0891908358
• ISBN-13: 978-0891908357
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 5.8 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.7 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #6,395,295 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars WAITING FOR ANOTHER BY SPILLANE WAS ALWAYS TOO LONG, February 9, 2004

By 

Gail Cooke (TX, USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (COMMUNITY FORUM 04)    (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Long Wait (Hardcover)

After he had penned his first novel, I, The Jury, in only nine days, Spillane sat down at the typewriter to quickly turn out some six more Hammer novels.

This particular thriller featuring Mike Hammer sold 3 million copies in one week. Spillane had become a phenomenon.

Today Mickey Spillane is 85-years-old, and acclaimed around the globe for inventing the hard-hitting, hard-boiled protagonist who is a compelling mix of sex and sharp shooting. It's hard to believe this many years have gone by for the Brooklyn born Spillane. He's outlasted and out sold many of his contemporaries, and when last heard from was still hard at work.

Perhaps those of us who love to read don't take time to thank the writers who have given us so many hours of pleasure. I certainly fall into that category, so a big hats off to Mickey Spillane and gratitude for the wealth of reading pleasure he's given so many.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars another hard-boiled, old-school yarn of mayhem and sex ..., June 7, 2006

By 

H. Bala "Me Too Can Read" (Just moved to posh Marina Del Rey, CA - where if you drop a quarter, why, you just keep on walking) - See all my reviews
(TOP 100 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Long Wait (Hardcover)

One was going to die. One was going to get both arms broken. One will be whipped to within an inch of her life. That was a promise he vowed to keep.

Five years ago, Johnny McBride was accused of embezzlement and murder, and was forced to skip town. Now someone claiming to be McBride is back in Lyncastle, looking to right the wrongs done him. But is it really Johnny? Or is it someone else playing a vicious game of chicken with Lenny Servo, local mob boss and the man who runs Lyncastle behind the scenes.

Mickey Spillane uses his well-honed stripped-down prose to inject no-holds-barred suspense and an atmosphere of immediacy into The Long Wait. Written in 1951, this book noir is still as thrilling as ever. His anti-hero, bent on evening the score for his recently demised best friend, is suffering from memory loss and yet is still game enough to ably bluff, connive and bully his way thru the suspicious denizens of Lyncastle, a once ordinary town become a gangster's paradise, replete with gambling casinos and other joints of ill repute. As McBride inexorably closes in on the truth of his frame-up, the stakes are raised, the violence from both sides is cranked up another notch, and our two-fisted, trigger-happy, take-no-prisoners amnesiac must rely on forgotten skills to survive and mete out his own blurry brand of justice.

Spillane writes like he doesn't give a damn, and I mean that in a good sense. His response to his literary critics was "Those big-shot writers could never dig the fact that there are more salted peanuts consumed than caviar." For his era, Spillane's books contained more than their share of violence and sexual content. I enjoy his lead character immensely. The Long Wait's hero is rude, abrasive and isn't afraid of getting his hands dirty, whether it's belting a hoodlum or three in the gut, roughing up a cop or grabbing a kiss from a flirtatious dame. This guy does and says things that we all wish we could get away with in public - as when a fat woman pokes our main man on the bus and tells him, "If you don't mind, I'd like that window shut." Our guy's response? "I'd like your mouth shut too." He's a riot. I saw the denouement coming a mile away but, to complete the cliche, the ride was worth getting there. The villains are your classic lowlife thugs, the women are all sexy and willing to be persuaded, the action is often and ferocious. Oboy, this Johnny McBride fella'll give Mike Hammer a run for his money.

For those interested, The Long Wait was made into a movie in 1954, starring Anthony Quinn and Charles Coburn.