Gumshoes

Winner, Modern Language Association Prize in United States Latina and Latino and Chicana and Chicano Literary and Cultural Studies, 2006 Popular fiction, with its capacity for diversion, can mask important cultural observations within a framework that is often overlooked in the academic world. Works thought to be merely "escapist" can often be more seriously mined for revelations regarding the worlds they portray, especially those of the disenfranchised. As detective fiction has slowly earned critical respect, more authors from minority groups have chosen it as their medium. Chicana/o authors, previously reluctant to write in an underestimated genre that might further marginalize them, have only entered the world of detective fiction in the past two decades. In this book, the first comprehensive study of Chicano/a detective fiction, Ralph E. Rodriguez examines the recent contributions to the genre by writers such as Rudolfo Anaya, Lucha Corpi, Rolando Hinojosa, Michael Nava, and Manuel Ramos. Their works reveal the struggles of Chicanas/os with feminism, homosexuality, familia, masculinity, mysticism, the nationalist subject, and U.S.-Mexico border relations. He maintains that their novels register crucial new discourses of identity, politics, and cultural citizenship that cannot be understood apart from the historical instability following the demise of the nationalist politics of the Chicana/o movement of the 1960s and 1970s. In contrast to that time, when Chicanas/os sought a unified Chicano identity in order to effect social change, the 1980s, 1990s, and 2000s have seen a disengagement from these nationalist politics and a new trend toward a heterogeneous sense of self. The detective novel and its traditional focus on questions of knowledge and identity turned out to be the perfect medium in which to examine this new self.

The enormous explosion of crime fiction over the last decade means that more people are looking for a good mystery than ever before. This dictionary of fictional detectives helps readers learn about the series in which their favorite detectives are featured. Included are alphabetically arranged entries on roughly 150 fictional detectives, which provide information about the works in which the detective appears, the locales in which the detective operates, the detective's investigative methods, and other important information. Helpful bibliographical citations direct the reader to other interesting works. The volume closes with a selected, general bibliography; various appendices; and an extensive index. The enormous explosion of crime fiction over the last decade means that more people are looking for a good mystery than ever before. Many of the most popular mystery books appear in series, and these series feature carefully developed detectives.

GUMSHOES is about a detective agency run by two middle school kids who are top tier detectives and genius level scientists. It's basically CSI for kids! In the first book of the series, the Gumshoes join forces with one of their classmates to unravel the mystery of her father's kidnapping. Through a combination of good investigating, hard science, and blind dumb luck, the trio inch their way closer and closer to the truth. But will it be enough to track down her father before something happens to him?

The hard-boiled style of detective fiction emerged in America in the years after the First World War. In the late 1940s, following the Depression, the New Deal, and the Second World War, a new generation of young writers revisited the conventions governing the fictional private eye, and began to move him (the tough detective was still always male) and his world in new directions. This book examines the work of the four most important writers of this second generation of hard-boiled fiction. It offers the first substantial literary analysis of the Max Thursday novels of Wade Miller and the Carney Wilde novels of Bart Spicer, and it develops new perspectives on the well-known Mike Hammer novels of Mickey Spillane and the Lew Archer novels of Ross Macdonald. A particular focus is upon the theme of the detective's status as a loner who succeeds in discovering truth and achieving justice because he works outside organized social structures.

The Sixties were a time of great cultural upheaval, when long-established social norms were challenged and everything changed: from music to fashion to social mores. And the Leave It to Beaver households in Middle America didn’t know what to make of it all. In the midst of this, private eyes tried to understand and bridge the generational divide while providing their clients with legal and extra-legal detecting services. From old-school private eyes with their flat-tops, off-the-rack suits, and well-worn brogues to the new breed of private eyes with their shoulder-length hair, bell-bottoms, and hemp sandals, the shamuses in Groovy Gumshoes take readers on a rollicking romp through the Sixties. With stories by Jack Bates, C.W. Blackwell, Michael Bracken, N.M. Cedeño, Hugh Lessig, Steve Liskow, Adam Meyer, Tom Milani, Neil S. Plakcy, Stephen D. Rogers, Mark Thielman, Grant Tracey, Mark Troy, Andrew Welsh-Huggins, and Robb White.

August is an undermotivated chinchilla shifter in a dead-end job until he inherits money and opens a detective agency in Sam's building.

The Sixties were a time of great cultural upheaval, when long-established social norms were challenged and everything changed: from music to fashion to social mores. And the Leave It to Beaver households in Middle America didn’t know what to make of it all. In the midst of this, private eyes tried to understand and bridge the generational divide while providing their clients with legal and extra-legal detecting services. From old-school private eyes with their flat-tops, off-the-rack suits, and well-worn brogues to the new breed of private eyes with their shoulder-length hair, bell-bottoms, and hemp sandals, the shamuses in More Groovy Gumshoes—a follow-up to the far-out original Groovy Gumshoes—take readers on another rollicking romp through the Sixties. Contributors include: Michael Chandos, Wil A. Emerson, Jeff Esterholm, John M. Floyd, Nils Gilbertson, Wendy Harrison, Dave H. Hendrickson, gay toltl kinman, Lynn Maples, Jarrett Mazza, John McFetridge, Robert Petyo, Graham Powell, Bev Vincent, Joseph S. Walker, and Stacy Woodson.

Originally published by Henry Holt in 1990.

These five novels in the Gumshoe Collection bring back the style of Mickey Spillane and Raymond Chandler. Each one with a rock-solid core delivered with an explosive punch and snappy dialogue that sometimes may be risqué , but is always humorous. When ex-IRS Agent Mortimer— call me “ Mort” — Angel launches his new gumshoe career, he immediately becomes Reno' s infamous finder of bodies and/or body parts. In Gumshoe, it' s the mayor' s missing head; in Gumshoe for Two, it' s the hand of a U.S. Senator; in Gumshoe on the Loose, it' s the hanging body of a missing rapper; in Gumshoe Rock, it' s a skull, stripped clean and white; in Gumshoe in the Dark, it' s the dead body of his female companion' s mother. PI-in-training-Mort definitely has a special knack, as does Rob Leininger, in delivering gritty crime novels sprinkled with spicy humor. All five books in the Gumshoe Collection are perfect for fans of Janet Evanovich, Carl Hiaasen, and Tim Dorsey

USA Today best-selling author IRS agent, feared and despised—a gumshoe for only four hours—finds Reno's missing mayor's head For nine long days, the mayor and district attorney of Reno, Nevada, have been missing. Vanished without a trace. Their vehicles were found parked side-by-side at Reno-Tahoe International Airport. Did they fly somewhere together? They aren't on any flight manifest. Did the two of them take off with a big pile of the city's money? If so, the city accountants can't find it. Were they murdered? There's no sign of foul play. Their disappearances have finally made national news. Enter Mortimer Angel, who'd just quit a thankless job as an IRS agent. Mort is Reno's newest gumshoe, a private-eye-in-training at his nephew's detective agency. Just four hours into his new career, Mort finds the mayor—make that, the mayor's head—in the trunk of Mort's ex-wife's Mercedes. The news-hungry media speculates: Did Mort kill the mayor? Did Mort's ex? As events begin to spin out of control, Mort realizes things have been out of control since the night before he started his new career, the night he found the unknown naked blonde in his bed. "Mortimer Angel is my new favorite Private Eye." —John Lescroart, New York Times best-selling author While all of the novels in the Mortimer Angel Gumshoe Series stand on their own and can be read in any order, the publication sequence is: Gumshoe Gumshoe for Two Gumshoe on the Loose Gumshoe Rock Gumshoe in the Dark