The John Franklin Bardin Omnibus (Penguin Crime Fiction) by John Franklin Bardin


The John Franklin Bardin Omnibus (Penguin Crime Fiction)
Title : The John Franklin Bardin Omnibus (Penguin Crime Fiction)
Author :
Rating :
ISBN : 0140041303
ISBN-10 : 9780140041309
Language : English
Format Type : Paperback
Number of Pages : 602
Publication : First published August 26, 1976

Between 1946 and 1948 John Franklin Bardin produced three quite extraordinary novels, all distinguished by a hallucinatory intensity of feeling and an absorption in morbid psychology remarkable for the period.

The Deadly Percheron, The Last of Philip Banter and Devil Take the Blue-Tail Fly are unlike anything else in modern crime literature.

For the first time all three have been gathered together in a single volume, and at long last reintroduce the work of a great and original writer.

The John Franklin Bardin Omnibus (Penguin Crime Fiction) Reviews

  • Tom Lichtenberg

    Bardin (as well as John Fante) was like a bridge between Dashiell Hammett and Philip K. Dick, between Raymond Chandler and David Lynch. He's hard-boiled, yet psychedelic, traditional yet wildly futuristic. The three novels contained in this volume are all pretty stunning.

  • Simon Duffy

    If you have any love of 40's and 50's detective writing find this book! One of the great unknown treasures of the past - John Franklin Bardin wrote three great stories and then edited a law revue for the rest of his life and never wrote about gumshoes again (as I recall the story from several decades ago). All three have been collected in this Omnibus which will not disappoint fans of Raymond Chandler and Dashiell Hammett.

  • Kumari de Silva

    One wonders what would have happened if Bardin could have finished college because he's so damn good as a self taught writer. I think the one thing you can't teach a person is how to have a good idea. Some people have good ideas but they aren't good at pacing, reveal, cadence, motif, or themes so they write what I call a "HAITE" story as in Here's An Idea, The End. But that is not what's happening here. Here is the grandfather of all unreliable narration. These stories are so creative, so unique. If you like film noir, you'll love 'em.

  • Dan

    Thrillers that make employment of psychoanalytic concepts to chilling effect. Enjoying Bardin’s work may require some suspension of intertextual knowledge: while some of the things he represents in these novels were new when he wrote, they have since become clichéd, having been reused in “movie of the week” type drama on television.

    Acquired Feb 8, 2008
    City Lights Book Shop, London, Ontario

  • Susanna

    Evocative psychological thrillers. I'm not sure people think that many steps ahead....but what a great world he brings to life.