The Associated Press is reporting that Mickey Spillane, the macho mystery writer who wowed millions of readers with the shoot-’em-up sex and violence of gumshoe Mike Hammer, died Monday. Married three times, Spillane was the father of four children. He was 88.
After starting out in comic books, Spillane wrote his first Mike Hammer novel, I, the Jury, in 1946. Twelve more followed, with sales topping 100 million. Besides the Hammer novels, Spillane wrote a dozen other books, including some award-winning volumes for young people.
He was a quintessential Cold War writer, an unconditional believer in good and evil. He was also a rare political conservative in the book world. Communists were villains in his work and liberals took some hits as well. He was not above using crude racial and sexual stereotypes.
While the Hammer books were set in New York, Spillane was a longtime resident of Murrells Inlet, a coastal community near Myrtle Beach, South Carolina.
Read this entire article as published on MSNBC.com here.
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Monday, July 17, 2006
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