Neha Patil (Editor)

The Real Cool Killers

Updated on
Edit
Like
Comment
Share on FacebookTweet on TwitterShare on LinkedInShare on Reddit
7.8
/
10
1
Votes
Alchetron
7.8
1 Ratings
100
90
80
71
60
50
40
30
20
10
Rate This

Rate This

Cover artist
  
Terrance Cummings

Language
  
English

Originally published
  
1958

Preceded by
  
The Five Cornered Square

Publisher
  
Avon

3.9/5
Goodreads

Country
  
United States

Publication date
  
1959

Author
  
Chester Himes

Followed by
  
The Crazy Kill

Genres
  
Crime Fiction, Hardboiled

The Real Cool Killers t1gstaticcomimagesqtbnANd9GcSzjcLEZlTp3KL9we

Original title
  
Il pleut des coups durs

Series
  
Grave Digger Jones & Coffin Ed Johnson Mysteries

Similar
  
Chester Himes books, Harlem Detective books, Hardboiled books

The Real Cool Killers is a Hardboiled Crime Fiction novel written by Chester Himes. Published in 1959, it is the second book in the Grave Digger Jones & Coffin Ed Johnson Mysteries. The protagonists of the novel, Grave Digger Jones and Coffin Ed, are a pair of black detectives who patrol the dangerous slums of Harlem. The book was originally published in French under the title Il pleut des coups durs.

Contents

For booker ervin the real cool killers parades and saints


Plot

The plot concerns the murder of Ulysses Galen, who was found dead in one of the streets of Harlem. Detectives Grave Digger Jones and Coffin Ed Johnson must investigate the murder and follow up various leads as to who might have had a reason to kill Galen.

Reception

In a brief review of The Real Cool Killers, The New York Times described crime novels as "guilty pleasures for the guilty minded". In another brief review, Berkeley scientist John McDonald commented on the book's racial tension, praising the book's "dark wit."

Literary criticism

The Real Cool Killers has been subject of literary criticism, most notably for its depiction of African-American characters Grave Digger Jones and Coffin Ed Johnson. Digger especially is seen vocalizing his feelings over the murders and the indifference from the authorities. In her book At Home in Diaspora: Black International Writing, Wendy Walters describes the book's two detectives as "viable folk heroes for the urban community". Megan Abbott analyzed the book in The Street Was Mine, noting the depiction of Galen and how it differed from other depictions of white men in books such as Farewell, My Lovely, and how Himes "moves black male characters from representations peripheral and stereotypical (as icons of degeneration or service industry employees) to the center". In "Born in a Mighty Bad Land" Jerry H Bryant wrote "There is ... a kind of clinical as well as cultural element in Himes's treatment of the violent man in the Harlem of the fifties and sixties".

References

The Real Cool Killers Wikipedia