The Comic Book Killer by Richard A. Lupoff

The strength of the mystery is this moment-this brick, this street, this strand of hair, unique to this person and this place at this precise instant never to be repeated. The difference between mystery and science fiction is not intellectual, but it is profound. James Ellroy’s Suicide Hill really is depicting our society in the midst of such a suicidal self-destruction. Richard Stark’s entire oeuvre, as well as novels such as Andrew Vachss’ Flood and Shaun Herron’s The Whore Mother suggest, without making any particular point of it, that it would be just as well if the whole bloody social structure should come crashing down. Hammett himself was no supporter of the status quo. Just as obviously, there are radical mysteries.

There are obviously conservative science fiction novels- Heinlein’s Stranger in a Strange Land. Because to me, the difference between the two fields is artistic, not in such terms as radical and conservative. I have written in the future tense, stories which tend to be much darker and more bitter than my mystery stories. Most science fiction writers have tried or at least contemplated the mystery during their professional lives-and vice versa. He calls science fiction an essentially radical literature subversive of society, while he finds the mystery essentially supportive of society and basically conservative in its attitude.īut the mystery and science fiction have always had a symbiotic attraction for each other.

At first glance this may seem surprising, since Lupoff has said he finds mystery and science fiction mutually exclusive, likening them to oil and water with a basic philosophical conflict between them. With The Comic Book Killer, Nebula and Hugo nominated science fiction and fantasy writer Dick Lupoff moves from science fiction to the mystery for the first time. One Murder at a Time: The Casebook of Lindsey & Plum COPYRIGHT INFORMATIONĬopyright © 1988, 2012 by Richard A. Sword of the Demon The Lindsey & Plum Detective Seriesĩ. The Adventures of Professor Thintwhistle & His Incredible Aether Flyer (with Steve Stiles) ABOUT THE AUTHOR BORGO PRESS BOOKS BY RICHARD A.

The Comic Book Killer by Richard A. Lupoff