The Plunge

By David Goodis

Roy Childers is a detective who has tried to stay clean in a corrupt police force. He becomes obsessed with finding escaped convict Dice Nolan. But his stakeout leads him into an illicit affair and a fierce jealousy that causes him to lose control. When the truth about a murder emerges, Childers plunges into darkness, realizing that the line between right and wrong is not always clear. A gripping psychological noir exploring the fall of a moral man.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Black Cat Weekly
• Release date: Nov 9, 2023
• ISBN: 9781667630380

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Table of Contents

COPYRIGHT INFORMATION

INTRODUCTION, by Karl Wurf

THE PLUNGE, by David Goodis

COPYRIGHT INFORMATION

Originally published in Mike Shayne Mystery Magazine, Oct. 1958.

Published by Wildside Press LLC.

wildsidepress.com | bcmystery.com

INTRODUCTION,

by Karl Wurf

David Goodis (1917-1967) was an American writer of crime fiction best known for his hardboiled novels set in his hometown of Philadelphia. Goodis studied journalism at Indiana University of Pennsylvania and Temple University before moving to New York City to pursue a career as a writer.

He found early success scripting crime serials for radio programs in the 1940s. His first novel, Retreat from Oblivion, was published in 1939, but it was his 1946 novel Dark Passage that brought him mainstream attention. The book was adapted into a classic film starring Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall the following year.

Goodis wrote several more novels throughout the 1940s and 1950s, releasing books such as Shoot the Piano Player, The Burglar, and Street of No Return. His works were often bleak portrayals of down-and-out characters living on the fringes of society.

Described as the poet of the losers, Goodis exerted a major influence on subsequent generations of crime writers. Despite periods of success, he died in relative obscurity in 1967. Current readers are rediscovering his work, with many of his short stories being reprinted.

THE PLUNGE,

by David Goodis

Seven out of ten are slobs, he was thinking. There was no malice or disdain in the thought. It was more a mixture of pity and regret. And that made it somewhat sickening, for he was referring specifically to the other men who wore badges, his fellow-policemen. More specifically still, he was thinking of the nine plainclothesmen attached to the Vice Squad. Only yesterday they’d been caught with their palms out, hauled in before the Commissioner, and called all sorts of names before they were suspended.

But, of course, the suspensions were temporary. They’d soon be back on the job, their palms extended again, accepting the shakedown money with the languid smile that seemed to say, It’s all a part of the game.

He’d never believed in that cynical axiom, had never let it touch him during his seventeen years on the city payroll. From rookie to Police Sergeant