FORGOTTEN BOOKS #421: JUST THE WAY IT IS/BLONDE’S REQUIEM By James Hadley Chase


Greg Shepard’s Introduction traces the successful writing career of Rene Lodge Brabazon Raymond, aka “James Hadley Chase,” a British writer who wrote 90 thriller novels–most of them set in America. A James Hadley Chase novel features hard-boiled action and usually a noirish ending. STARK HOUSE has been reprinting omnibus editions of James Hdley Chase novels. This latest omnibus edition includes Just the Way It Is and Blonde’s Requiem. Just the Way It Is (1944) is the story of gangsters in a small town. What makes this novel unusual is Chase’s devleopment of two women characters: Lucille, a gangster’s moll, and Clare Russell, a plucky reporter. Blonde’s Requiem (1945) caused Chase problems because he borrowed heavily from Raymond Chandler’s Farewell, My Lovely in plot construction. The book has been out-of-print for 70 years.

If you’re looking for traditional thrillers with violence, deception, betrayal, and drama, this STARK HOUSE omnibus will fulfill your yearning for noir.

29 thoughts on “FORGOTTEN BOOKS #421: JUST THE WAY IT IS/BLONDE’S REQUIEM By James Hadley Chase

  1. Deb

    I think I read somewhere that Chase never actually visited America–everything he wrote about was based on American pulps that he read, which might account for some of his “plagiarism”. The only book of his I think I’ve read is NO ORCHIDS FOR MISS BLANDISH, a bit of a ripoff of Faulkner’s SANCTUARY. Still, if more of his work is now available, I’ll have to read a few more.

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    1. george Post author

      Deb, like Edgar Rice Burroughs who achieved success with his Tarzan novels–and who never visited Africa–Chase never visited America although most of his thrillers are set in the U.S. His reading of American pulps and novels provided his “research.”

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      1. wolfi

        I think he was not the only one from Britain who wrote “as an American” and of course there were many German authors too who tried their hand at this, sometimes with strange results …
        The most famous was Karl May with his Indians and Cowboys stories, but that was mainly in the 19th Century …

      2. george Post author

        Wolf, James Hadley Chase produced a series of successful thrillers over decades. The covers on the Corgi paperbacks from the 1970s were spectacular!

      3. neer

        I am not sure but I have heard that Keating also never visited India though he wrote all those Inspector Ghote novels.

  2. Deb

    Yes–I absolute love the pattern on that…I’m not sure, sari? Tablecloth? Wall hanging? That pattern is spectacular!

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  3. Jeff Meyerson

    I like “borrowed heavily” for what he did. I’m sure Chandler was not amused.

    Like Deb, the only Chase I’ve read is NO ORCHIDS FOR MISS BLANDISH. Frankly, he would come far down my list of authors to revisit, below Carroll John Daly.

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    1. george Post author

      Jeff, occasionally Chase would stub his toe stylistically. In a couple of the Chase books I’ve read he refers to the car’s truck as the “boot.”

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  4. Rick Robinson

    After a stretch of every book I come across looking good to me, and then an avalanche of things of all sorts coming from the library, now nothing seems interesting to me, including this one. I have Blandish, but no other Chase, and haven’t even read that. Just feeling pretty blah about books right now, I guess. I’m glad you enjoyed it.

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  5. maggie mason

    I think I have Blandish someplace, hope it made it thru my great book purge.

    I’d heard of him, but haven’t read any. I have a vague recollection of Blandish being highly recommended, much more than any of his others, though the covers were always striking

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  6. Cap'n Bob

    That got through, but my real message didn’t. It had to do with Chase writing that a heist haul was made up of $100 and $25 bills.

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  7. Deb

    That puts me in mind of a Martin Amis book I gave up on (THE INFORMATION, perhaps?) which is partly set in Southern California, where I was living at the time. A character in the book gets a copy of the Los Angeles Times and finds an item in a particular section of the paper–but the L.A. Times did not have such a section; I knew that because I read it every day. I thought to myself, how hard would of it be for Amis, living in London (even in the pre-Internet days) to get a copy of the LAT and verify the existence of said section? I gave up in irritation after that!

    Reply
    1. george Post author

      Deb, I’m with you on mis-steps in the setting of a novel. If the author can’t get the little details right, how can they get the Big Details right.

      Reply

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