Novels and Short Stories
Shayne debuted in the novel Dividend on Death first published in 1939, written by Halliday, a pseudonym of Davis Dresser. Dresser wrote fifty Shayne novels, with the help of Ryerson Johnson. Twenty seven more were written by Robert Terrall for a total of 77; 300 short stories, a dozen films, radio and television shows, and a few comic book appearances have included the character.
The books were typically very well plotted, with Shayne always gathering the suspects at the end and explaining the crime and naming the murderer. Shayne was initially married in the novels, his wife being Phyllis Shayne, who was a somewhat limited character, and was often out of town. Dresser "killed her off" when he sold the movie rights to the series. In the book Blood on the Black Market, the comedy aspect of the earlier novels disappears, and Shayne is forced to deal with his wife's death.
Halliday stopped writing the Shayne novels after Murder and the Wanton Bride in 1958. The character continued in novels written by Ryserson Johnson, Robert Terrell and Dennis Lynds.
Some of these Halliday ghost writers have suggested that Dresser still kept his hand in, even after other writers largely took over the writing of the novels, by doing at least a light edit of the Shayne manuscripts contributed by others, and thus making the later books in the series "ghost-collaborated" rather than actually "ghost-written".
Read more about this topic: Michael Shayne
Famous quotes containing the words novels, short and/or stories:
“Society is the stage on which manners are shown; novels are the literature. Novels are the journal or record of manners; and the new importance of these books derives from the fact, that the novelist begins to penetrate the surface, and treat this part of life more worthily.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“In this age, which believes that there is a short cut to everything, the greatest lesson to be learned is that the most difficult way is, in the long run, the easiest.”
—Henry Miller (1891–1980)
“But stories that live longest
Are sung above the glass,
And Parnell loved his country
And Parnell loved his lass.”
—William Butler Yeats (1865–1939)