Ed McBain's The Heckler - Episode 12: The Magnificats!

Hark! It's the 87th Precinct Podcast

The year is 1960 and the second of McBain's 87th Precinct books was The Heckler - a tale of threatening phone-calls, actual murders and some bombs along the way. Marvel at the machiavellian machinations of the 87th Precinct's nemesis-to-be and witness the inside of Detective Steve Carella's unconscious mind.

Along the way we discuss the real-life women who changed the world Ed McBain wrote about - Detective Mary Fitzgerald and crime-fiction critic Marilyn Stasio and we offer some critique of his rather chest-obsessed prose in this novel.

K.E.N.N.E.T.H. comes out of winter retirement to calculate the scores and we ponder what it would be like to have to try and apprehend a criminal whilst wearing 85 police shields on your uniform.

Join us soon for the bonus episode and then our look at Kurosawa's High & Low. The next book in the sequence is "See Them Die" - get your reading eyes washed and ready to go! Thanks for listening - remember a rating, share or review would be greatly appreciated.

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Hunter's Computer

I've always been pretty fascinated by computers. I got my first computer in 1985/6, I think. It was a Commodore Plus/4 and was one of the strangest ones you could get. I think my parents were sold it by an over-enthusiastic salesman in York (I imagine he had a stock-room full of them and needed to get them shifted). Anyway, I learned to type and program on it and I could play "Jack Attack" so that was okay. 

It must have been about this time that Evan Hunter got his Apple IIe computer, I imagine. It had been introduced in 1983 and was to become the longest serving computer in Apple's range, staying in production until the '90s. If only their products lasted/were supported that long now. Curse you, built in redundancy.

We know this was the machine Hunter used, as an article in the Washington Post ("Ed McBain's Mysterious Method") refers to him using it in 1990. I don't really know why I find this sort of detail so fascinating. Perhaps because we still envisage the author as being sat in front of a manual typewriter, savagely bashing at the keys, cursing and scrumpling up another sheet of paper - the ding of the bell as another sentence is committed to the page. Of course authors, especially successful ones, would have moved to word-processors and computers as soon as they could. Douglas Adams was a famous advocate of technology, particularly Apple products, having pipped Stephen Fry to the post in buying the first Apple Macintosh sold in London.

So there you are. Have a read of the Washington Post article linked above and have a look at the Centre For Computing History's page all about the Apple IIe. Tools of the trade!

- Paul

Solo-Pod - Ed McBain Books in the 1950s: DYNAMIC K.E.N.N.E.T.H.

Hark! It's an 87th Precinct Podcast Solo Episode!

Whilst we get organised for our next podcast proper (Ed McBain's "The Heckler") we've provided this little stopgap, with a look back over the books we've covered that were released in the 1950s. 

During this solo excursion, Paul recaps the books, the adaptations, who's who in the squadroom and tells you all about K.E.N.N.E.T.H., our scoring computer, via some newly discovered archive evidence. Detective Steve Carella pops by as well.

Please continue to get involved via Twitter (@Hark87Podcast), email (Hark87Podcast@gmail.com) and via the comments and reviews on the podcast platforms. We really appreciate your listening to our podcast and look forward to a great 2018 sharing our Ed McBain love with you all. 

(Additional script by Robert Charnock. Additional music provided under Creative Commons from freesfx.com)