23. The Naked City by Stirling Silliphant

This was a fun, little read.  I started off thinking I was going to love it, as it had a sparse prose style, great NYC location (and love for the city) and a strong lead-in to the two main cops (the young recently promoted detective getting paired up with the hardcore but soulful vet).  It veered a little too sentimental as it went on and as it is basically the episodes written in short story format, it lacked the depth to make it truly fulfilling.  Nevertheless a quick enjoyable read that led me to the classic old school Hollywood career of Stirling Siliphant and some of his TV shows (including The Naked City which also started out as a noir feature that I want to see).

My favourite story here was SUsequehanna 7-8367 about one of the many young girls who came (and probably still come) to NYC to seek their fortune.  She installs a telephone, a big exciting step and the first thing she gets is a call from a girl asking for Larry who is then threatened and presumably murdered.  The cops believe her but don't make much of an effort to help her, so she goes out and starts investigating on her own.  It's a nice combo of cool legwork (she hunts down the telephone installer) and a spunky character.  It all ends a bit abruptly, but was fun nonetheless.  

I didn't know about Stirling Silliphant and actually have not seen very much of his large body of television and movie work.  But when you read his bio and credits, you can see how he significantly impacted much of the content I grew up on (he wrote for the Mickey Mouse Club which always had these weird adventure stories) and enjoy today.  He was from the elevated perspective on the common man school of writing and loved genre.  He was a friend of Bruce Lee and a big supporter of his career. One of those manly, cool 20th century hardcore writers.