Kiss Me, Deadly is a 1952 Mike Hammer novel by Mickey Spillane. Fun enough, if you can get past the heavy-handed sexism and the repetitive prose. The plot does move well, and there's plenty of action.
Spillane likes women's lips and spends a lot of time describing them, always the same way:
Her mouth was expressive, with full, ripe lips that shone wetly, a crimson blossom that hid even white teeth....
She smiled at me, her mouth a gorgeous curve that had a peculiar attraction so that you almost missed the body that bore it. Her mouth was full and wet as if it had just been licked, a lush mouth with a will of its own and always hungry....
Her mouth was still a wet thing, deliciously red, firm, yet ready to vibrate like the strings on a fiddle the moment they were touched....
Her mouth was too close and too soft to just look at. My fingers seemed to get caught in her hair and suddenly those lovely, wet lips were only inches away, and just as suddenly there was no distance at all....
The bubbling warmth was just what I expected. The fire and the cushiony softness and the vibrancy made a living bed of her mouth.
I could feel her go all tight against me, saw her do that trick with her tongue that left her mouth damp and waiting....
The wetness glistened on her lips. They were firm lips, large, ripe, parted slightly over the even lines of her teeth. There was fire there that grew hotter as I came closer. I could see her mouth open even more, the tip of her tongue impatiently waiting, then the impatience broke and it met me before the lips didAnd I began to feel a horror movie coming on: The Big Wet Lips. AIIIEEEEE!
Kirkus Reviews says, "Tough as they come- but expert in the field."
The photo at the top of the page is from Amazon.com.
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Somehow I didn't remember Mickey Spillane's writing being that bad. But after reading some of your quotes, I shook my head and wondered what I ever saw in those mysteries. In a way, it's almost laughable, isn't it? I'll join you at the BIG WET LIPS horror show and we'll have coffee afterward!
ReplyDeleteOh, it's sooo bad lol! It does have a bit of so-bad-it's-funny to it.We'll definitely enjoy that horror movie and coffee, though, while we discuss its lack of merit ;)
DeleteThose quotes made me lol; I haven´t read a Mickey Spillane this side of 1985 and I think I may not consider it now!
ReplyDeleteI'm thinking he was not a bad author but was writing for a target audience that liked this style. It was the 1950s, and he originally intended Mike Hammer to be a comic book character where those lips would've been drawn instead of graphically described in writing lol. Maybe that would've been better lol.
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