McBain’s ‘Money’ a Crisp Entry in Continuing Cop Saga

“Money, Money, Money” (Simon & Schuster, $25, 271 pages), Ed McBain’s new novel about the cops of the 87th Precinct of Isola, a fictional East Coast city not unlike New York, takes place during the Christmas season. Appropriately, the book is an early gift for readers, a mordant but oddly cheery package that reaffirms the author’s status as a leader in the mystery field. Though it is entry 51 in the acclaimed police procedural series, it is as crisp and fresh as if it were marking a debut.

One of the ways McBain (the pen name Evan Hunter uses for his crime fiction) has kept the continuing cop saga from bogging down is by shifting moods and approaches. The books consist of character studies, puzzling crimes, humor and suspense, but the weight of each element varies from novel to novel. Here, while following the convoluted trail of $1.9 million in drug cash and the woe it brings to a variety of involved participants, the author seems in an unusually playful mood.

Several events are savagely brutal. A beautiful and, one would have thought, resourceful former Air Force pilot winds up as lion chow in the Isola zoo. There’s a team of sadistic hit women who cut a swath through the city’s underworld population and a trio of anti-Zionist terrorists. And a perpetually famished detective, on a visit to inform a wife of her husband’s grisly demise, ignores the woman’s grief while angling for a taste of food baking in the oven.

There are a number of unexpected and amusing twists and turns involving gangs, thugs, book publishers, the CIA, a bank robber with heart and series lead Steve Carella’s midlife crisis. All neatly tied with a bright ribbon.

Though “Money” is funnier than the usual 87th Precinct tale, Robert S. Levinson’s third novel about formerly married newsman Neil Gulliver and actress Stevie Marriner, “The John Lennon Affair” (Forge, $24.95, 320 pages), is a bit more serious than their previous entanglements. The author, relying on personal memories (from his years as a rock ‘n’ roll publicist) along with an apparently vivid imagination, pulls out all the stops for a tale spanning the decades separating Lennon’s murder and a fictional contemporary music festival to be held in Palm Springs in his honor.

The first two series entries, “The Elvis and Marilyn Affair” and “The James Dean Affair” were witty, fast-paced adventures in which the couple investigated the death styles of the rich and famous. Without discarding that “Thin Man” mood, Levinson has crafted a richer and more poignant novel. A good portion of it is devoted to Gulliver’s past--a mixture of fact and fiction that includes his introduction to the hard world of journalism, his meeting with cynical veteran scribe Augie Fowler and his friendship with famous singer-composer Harry Nilsson.

The present-day puzzle, concerning the CIA, the mayor of Palm Springs, a capo or two and a conspiracy plot, is complex enough to challenge the ratiocinative powers of all of McBain’s cops, Nero Wolfe, Ellery Queen and the redoubtable Sherlock Holmes. But when it focuses on the emotions of its characters, the novel is remarkably clear and effective. Its depiction of Gulliver’s days as a young reporter is particularly compelling, as are the passages describing the immediate aftermath of Lennon’s assassination--moving from the sadness of Beatles friends and fans to the sociopathic arrogance of his killer, Mark David Chapman. One wonders how long it might be before Levinson gifts us with a nonfiction memoir.

Fifteen years ago, Les Roberts, a show business veteran who once produced “The Hollywood Squares,” entered a manuscript in a contest sponsored by St. Martin’s Press and the Private Eye Writers of America and won. Since then he has published 17 detective novels, some featuring L.A. private sleuth Saxon, more chronicling the adventures of Cleveland-based P.I. Milan Jacovich. Probably created as a result of the author’s relocation to the city on the Cuyahoga, the fiercely Slovakian American shamus (the name is pronounced “YOCK-o-vitch,” he instructs us) is otherwise a modern version of Raymond Chandler’s Philip Marlowe. That is to say, he’s a tough white knight who prowls the mean streets, solving cases that rarely have to do with world domination or international diplomacy.

In “The Dutch” (St. Martin’s, $23.95, 293 pages), he has one of his closest brushes with high concept, investigating the death of a Web-page designer. Ellen Carnine apparently was despondent enough over her lack of physical beauty that she jumped to her death off the Hope Memorial Bridge (named in honor of Bob Hope’s father). Did she “do the Dutch,” or was she pushed? Jacovich’s investigation includes observations about his changing city that are rich in history and colored by his distrust of the new. His studies of those involved in the case, particularly the dead woman’s self-absorbed associates, are even more detailed and critical. The case is a tricky one involving, of course, much more than suicide or even murder for profit. The Internet comes in for a goodly share of the guilt, as do the greed heads who misuse it without thought of consequence.

Unlike Chandler’s Marlowe, but in keeping with modern crime fighters, Jacovich has a real life beyond the job. The taste we get of it--the narrowing of the gap between him and his college-age son--has a nice substantial feel to it that works well to counter the disturbing sense of evil that the investigation exposes. As that evil blossoms into full malignancy, Roberts quickens the pace with escalating villainies and dangers until, finally, he delivers a satisfying ending that, unconsciously or not, puts a modern twist to one of Mickey Spillane’s most inspired exits.

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Dick Lochte, author of ‘Lucky Dog and Other Tales of Murder’ (Five Star) and the prize-winning novel ‘Sleeping Dog’ (Poisoned Pen Press), reviews mysteries every other week.