From School Library Journal
Grade 10 Up –
Slamm!is an appropriate title for this collection of hard-boiled detective stories in which characters continually slam into one another. The selections make readers privy to numerous fight scenes in which one character's clenched fist slams into his opponent's face, dislodging teeth and splattering blood. In "Granny Gumption Solves a Murder," one man continually slams into an elderly woman, alternately using his cane and foot until she is bludgeoned and stomped to death. While the author may have intended this as a parody of the Miss Marple type of mystery story, the ageist and misogynistic undertones are hard to ignore. Henderson's stories draw on the tradition of the detective story established by Dashiell Hammett, Raymond Chandler, and Mickey Spillane, retaining such genre trappings as vernacular language, the femme fatale, and a ruggedly masculine gumshoe who juggles criminal investigation, sexual conquest, and fist fights with equal ease. The various illustrators are particularly adept at depicting the violent aspects of these stories, but the quality is inconsistent. Not for the faint of heart, this book may appeal to readers of Henderson's work and fans of "Preacher" and "John Constantine: Hellblazer" (both DC Comics), two graphic novel series of considerably higher merit. However, the mature content, depiction of graphic violence, and the treatment of women make this unsuitable for school libraries.
–Philip Charles Crawford, Essex High School, Essex Junction, VT
Product Description
Eleven tales of hate, despair and runaway violence from today's premier writer of hardboiled fiction, CJ Henderson(novelist and Punisher/Batman scribe)! It's bounty hunters, sex addicts, vampires and more, set against backdrops of revenge, defiance, and urban madness.
