THE FABULOUS CLIPJOINT

An Ed & Am Hunter Mystery

Fredric Brown

“Ingenious . . . Plunges the reader into a desperate, working-class America now better known through William Lindsay Gresham’s precisely contemporary novel Nightmare Alley and such film-noir classics as Out of the Past and The Postman Always Rings Twice.”
—Washington Post

“[Fredric Brown is] my favorite writer of all time.”
—Mickey Spillane

When Wally Hunter is found bludgeoned to death in an alley in Chicago’s near north side, his 18-year-old son, Ed, and carney brother, Ambrose, team up to find out who killed him. Winner of the 1948 Edgar Award, The Fabulous Clipjoint was Fredric Brown’s first novel, launching the Ed & Am Hunter mystery series and establishing Brown as one of the 20th century’s finest crime writers.

This edition of The Fabulous Clipjoint includes the unabridged text, an informative introduction, and a detailed author bio.

“[Ed & Am are] an engaging pair of detectives . . . [Fredric Brown is] a real pro—a natural storyteller.” —New York Times

“[E]nough good people put Brown on their must-read lists and then become evangelists to keep his name alive on the same high shelf as Hammett, Thompson, Ross Macdonald, and other crime icons.”
—Dick Adler, Chicago Tribune

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Fredric Brown (1906–1972) was an American writer known both for his work as an author of mysteries and science fiction. He first gained prominence for his hundreds of short stories that ran in the crime and sci-fi pulps during the 1930s and ’40s. In 1947 he wrote his first novel, The Fabulous Clipjoint, a mystery that won that year’s Edgar Award. He would go on to publish 27 more novels, both mysteries and science fiction, including six more Ed & Am Hunter Mysteries.