Martians and Misplaced Clues
Subtitle: The Life and Work of Fredric Brown
By: Jack Seabrook.
Publisher: Bowling Green State University Popular Press
Published: 1993
Place of publication: Bowling Green, OH
Language: eng
Format: Paperback
Number of pages: 312
Subjects: Brown, Fredric, 1906-1972.; Authors, American -- 20th century -- Biography.
Other titles: Martians & misplaced clues.
Description: "In my dream I was reaching right through the glass of the window of a hock shop. It was the hock shop on North Clark Street, the west side of the street, half a block north of Grand Avenue. I was reaching out a hand through the glass to touch a silver trombone..." So begins The Fabulous Clipjoint, winner of the 1948 Edgar Award for best first mystery novel.

In that and more than 20 other novels, Fredric Brown spun a web of intrigue and imagination that has made him one of the most popular and respected authors of mystery and science fiction of the middle decades of the twentieth century.

In Martians and Misplaced Clues, the first full-length book devoted to the work and life of Fredric Brown, Jack Seabrook discusses The Fabulous Clipjoint in depth, as well as Martians, Go Home, The Screaming Mimi and all of the other classic Brown novels.

He also provides careful analysis of the author's many short stories and poems, tracking his work from the early days as a writer for trade magazines, through the years of the pulp magazines and science fiction digests, up to and including the final years of increasingly respectable slick magazines.

Along with the discussion of the work are details of the author's unusual life, from his early years in Cincinnati through the Depression years in Milwaukee, then to a bohemian life living in various towns in the Southwest. Brown's career as a writer was colorful and varied, and Martians and Misplaced Clues places him squarely in the middle of the most irresistible and consistently enjoyable writers of his time.
Notes: "A list of writings by Frederic Brown": p. 265-286.
Includes bilbiographical references (p. 287-294) and index.
Table of contents: label: Chapter One
title: A Brief Biography
pagenum: 1; label: Chapter Two
title: Writing for Rent
pagenum: 13; label: Chapter Three
title: Early Mystery Stories
pagenum: 23; label: Chapter Four
title: The Hunters
pagenum: 41; label: Chapter Five
title: Poetry
pagenum: 61; label: Chapter Six
title: Late Mystery Stories
pagenum: 87; label: Chapter Seven
title: Novel Directions
pagenum: 13; label: Chapter Eight
title: The Southwest
pagenum: 125; label: Chapter Nine
title: Science Fiction Stories
pagenum: 145; label: Chapter Ten
title: Science Fiction Novels
pagenum: 171; label: Chapter Eleven
title: A Descent into Madness
pagenum: 193; label: Chapter Twelve
title: The Offices
pagenum: 221; label: Chapter Thirteen
title: A Short Subject
pagenum: 235; label: Chapter Fourteen
title: A Mysterious Decline
pagenum: 247; label: Notes
pagenum: 263; label: A List of Writings by Fredric Brown
pagenum: 265; label: Works Cited
pagenum: 287; label: Index
pagenum: 295