Big Plans for Good Work ~ A Review of "Big Red's Daughter" by John McPartland

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It's been a long time since I've reviewed a classic pulp, never mind one few ever talk about, but after wrapping up this work I knew I would have to talk about it. This is a book of its time in all the best possible ways and one that needs to be talked about more.

Readers might not recognize the name John McPartland when discussing pulps today, and there are several reasons for that beyond the usual when it comes to classic pulp authors.

The first is that he only wrote twelve books centered in his time of activity in the 1950s, and that he died of a heart attack at the young age of 47 while his career was still on the ascent.

The only pieces of news you will find of Mr. McPartland unfortunately are about his infidelity, or the anti-Communist piece he wrote for Life magazine which surely contributed to keeping him out of print. Otherwise he wrote two short stories for Argosy and Adventure, four screenplays, and a non-fiction book.

For a short career it was relatively prolific, and today I'm going to talk about the author's second novel, released in 1953, entitled Big Red's Daughter. I am unsure if it his most popular, but it is the one I heard of thank to Men of Violence magazine and the one currently being re-released as a double with the author's Tokyo Doll by Stark House in their Crime Classic series. This makes it the easiest work to get a hold of for those interested. It is also dynamite.

Now despite it being in a series entitled "Crime Classics" I would hesitate to call this a crime novel. There isn't really a mystery here, a crime happens a third of the way in but it isn't really the motivator for our protagonist. What I would call this is a Men's Adventure, even more defined as a Men's Romance. The story of Big Red's Daughter is about our hero attempting to catch the titular girl in the midst of the chaos surrounding him.

Jim Work has just returned from Korea and is looking to make a new start of it. During a drive one night he comes upon a tough guy named Buddy Brown and his girl, the aptly named Wild Kearny, daughter of infamous high roller Big Red. He falls in love with her at first sight, but to get her attention he has to go through a veritable gauntlet.

Jim ends up sucked into this upper class world of bored kids and debauchery because of her. When one of the young punks ends up dead, Jim must do all he can to save Wild and prove to this seedy world just the kind of man he is. It won't be easy, but it isn't as if he's the type to just walk away. Who could with a girl like Wild waiting for them?

To put it in perspective, this sub-200 page paperback begins with two fist fights and a car crash in the first two chapters. There is murder, a jailbreak, high stake confrontations, and a knife fight, as Jim attempts to get his girl and get to the rot at the center of this disturbing world. Does he have what it takes to win over Big Red's Daughter?

It's a brief length, but hot-blooded and hard-boiled as it gets as Jim Work is dragged deeper and deeper into a world he wants nothing to do with to get a girl he wants more than anything. If that isn't romance it is magical. And very, very dangerous.

The characters are all alive, expressive, and weird enough to show just what an odd world Work has fallen into. The action is sharp, brief, and vicious enough to make you squirm. The plot is brief and twisted enough to give you glued to the pages. Once you flip open to the beginning car crash you will be in it for the long haul.

In this age of milquetoast male protagonists and selfish female leads it is quite shocking to read a story where a man is allowed to be a man and a woman is allowed to be a woman without having to add in modern "reluctant" motivations or softhearted (or soft-headed) protagonists that spend the majority of the story wallowing or cursing their helplessness due to whatever trauma or disability used as an excuse to prevent action. You want adventure? Well, you'll get it here and without apology or excuse. This is why pulp storytelling has made a comeback in recent years.

And why it's here to stay.

This book is intense, romantic, honest, and a fun read. That is all you really need for a good story. Big Red's Daughter is an excellent pulp novel and one of the best I've read.

Highly recommended.

I'm also working on my own style of Men's Adventure, a fantastical weird adventure where things get stranger the deeper you get into it. Gemini Warrior is the first step into this journey, and I will be making more in the not too distant future.

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