The Snarl of the Beast - Paperback

by Carroll John Daly (Author)

Before Raymond Chandler's The Big Sleep, Before Dashiell Hammett's The Red Harvest, there was Carroll John Daly's The Snarl of the Beast, the first true hard-boiled detective novel. Featuring Race Williams, a private detective afraid of no man, it is a complex story of murder and inheritance in which Williams must outwit not only the police and a beautiful blonde cat burglar, but a homicidal maniac reputed to be bullet proof. Will his ready fists and forty-four revolvers be up to the task of confronting his foes against the background of deceit, double-crossing, and gunplay? And ultimately will he silence . . . The Snarl of the Beast?

Author Biography

Carroll John Daly (September 14, 1889-January 16, 1958) was an American author of crime fiction. Born in Yonkers, New York, he was one of the early writers for the magazine Black Mask, he is credited with writing the first true hard-boiled detective story, "The Knights of the Open Palm" which was published in the magazine in June, 1923, several months before the first of Dashiell Hammett's Continental Op stories. During his career which spanned four decades he wrote well over a hundred stories and fifteen novels. Many of these featured the character Race Williams, the prototypical hard-boiled private detective from New York. He died in Los Angeles, California.