SPILLANE - King of Pulp Fiction
SPILLANE – King of Pulp Fiction A Biography By Max Allan Collins & James L. Traylor Mysterious Press 337 pgs. After reading this book, our initial reaction was that we’d actually been given the history of not one person, but two. Writers Collins and Traylor deftly interweave the story of both the real Mickey Spillane with that of his most famous fictional character, Mike Hammer. With both Collins and Traylor bonafide fans of both, what results is a truly intimate reflection of two equally fascinating and complex beings. Now allow us to backtrack a wee bit. In the early 60s we were in high school discovering so many different writers who forever change our lives. From Edgar Rice Burroughs to Robert E. Howard, Ed McBain to Richard S. Prather and Donald Hamilton. All were found the twenty-five cents paperbacks we devoured weekly. Way more interesting fare than what was dished out in our literature classics. Somehow, among all this reading, we missed Spillane unti