In pulp detective magazines of the 1920s, women had few significant roles beyond that of helpless victim in need of rescue by an intrepid gumshoe or daring police detective. However, by the 1930s, women characters had come into their own as femme fatales, jewel thieves, gun molls, feisty reporters, and gangsters in their own right. The male market welcomed women characters with the advent as such magazines as Saucy Stories, Gun Molls, and Spicy Detective, fronted by titillating covers of semi-clad beauties.

In Pulp Fiction - The Dames: An Omnibus, well known editor Otto Penzler compiles 21 stories (plus one comic strip) published between 1923 and 1941 in Dime Detective, Detective Fiction Weekly, and Black Mask Magazine. Few of the authors will be familiar to most readers -- the exceptions being Raymond Chandler and Cornell Woolrich (represented respectively by Killer in the Rain and Angel Face), and Dashiell Hammett (The Girl with the Silver Eyes). However, as Penzler notes, respectable writers often penned stories for the pulps under pseudonyms, for as little as a half-cent a word. Titles of the stories included herein are illustrative of their nature: The Jane from Hell's Kitchen, Sally the Sleuth, Chosen to Die, and He Got What he Asked For are among the offerings. In this reviewer's opinion, quality of the stories is quite variable; they range from good to trashy, and most are chiefly of historical interest. If these are typical of the genre, with their stilted dialogue and amusingly - dated gender roles., then it's understandable that they are largely forgotten.

As a collection of short detective fiction, this compilation is at best mildly entertaining. However, readers interested in the history of the genre owe editor Otto Penzler a debt of gratitude for resurrecting stories that would otherwise be lost. This volume stands with Pulp Fiction: The Crime Fighters and Pulp Fiction: The Villains as fine illustrations of a bygone period in American fiction.

Below is a list of the stories included, along with my ratings on a 5* scale. Those marked with a  are unrated; I found them unremarkable. I've not rated the stories by Chandler and Hammett, well- known stories that I'd read before.

Laura Lippman: Introduction (4*)
Cornell Woolrich: "Angel Face" (2*)
Leslie T. White: "Chosen to Die" (2*)
Eric Taylor: "A Pinch of Snuff " (2*)
Raymond Chandler: "Killer in the Rain"
Adolphe Barreaux: "Sally the Sleuth" 
C. S. Montanye: "A Shock for the Countess" 
C. B. Yorke: "Snowbound" (3.5*)
Randolph Barr: "The Girl Who Knew Too Much" 
D. B. McCandless: "The Corpse in the Crystal" 
D. B. McCandless: "He Got What He Asked For" (2*)
P. T. Luman: "Gangster's Brand" 
Robert Reeves: "Dance Macabre" (3.5*)
Dashiell Hammett: "The Girl with the Silver Eyes"
Perry Paul: "The Jane from Hell's Kitchen" (1*)
Whitman Chambers: "The Duchess Pulls a Fast One" (1/2*)
Roger Torrey: "Mansion of Death" (1/2*)
Roger Torrey: "Concealed Weapon" 
Carlos Martinez: "The Devil's Bookkeeper" (0*)
Lars Anderson: "Black Legion" (0*)
Richard Sale: "Three Wise Men of Babylon" (3*)
Eugene Thomas: "The Adventure of the Voodoo Moon" (1*)
T. T. Flynn: "Brother Murder" (3.5*)
Stewart Sterling: "Kindly Omit Flowers" (3.5*) ( )

Okay - I confess this book is the point at which I gave up on this series.

Not that there weren't a few reasonable stories within the collection, but mostly because I'm really very very over the idea that all women are either tramps, or manipulators (or both), or victims, or pathetic, or stupid (well smart if they are manipulating)... and so on.

Even allowing for sensibility differences between when these stories were written and now, I just kept wondering if these authors had wives, or daughters, or mothers that they liked much. And I do know the difference between "fiction" and "reality" but this collection was so relentlessly, tediously predictably clichéd that it was a real struggle for me to finish. ( )

There are a few well-known names in the collection (Raymond Chandler, Dashiell Hammett, Cornell Woolrich), but most of the authors are either forgotten bestsellers of the past or untraceable hacks who wrote under a pseudonym. Penzler's introductions are wonderful -- providing just enough context about the author and the original publisher, without going overboard -- and they serve as a solid introduction to the world of pulpy publishing. The quality of the stories varies, but they are representative of a genre that included both the literary Hammett and the low-rent Spicy Detective.

While this is not a feminist collection by any means, there are a lot of spunky gals that can hold their own in the man's world of gangsters, police, journalists, and private eyes -- even if they do wear extremely tight dresses and bat their eyes a few times while doing so.

This is a really great collection -- highly recommended if you like mysteries, gangsters, or pulpy action and adventure.

[full review here: http://spacebeer.blogspot.com/2011/02/pulp-fiction-dames-edited-by-otto.html ] ( )