KISSES OF DEATH
by Max Allan Collins
The doyen of the hard-boiled historical (Mourn the Living, 1999, etc.) has taken time out from his feverish production of novels, stories, and comic strips to assemble six stories and a novella, 1996–2001, in which Nate Heller, private eye to celebrity clients, tromps through American history from the ’30s through the ’60s, investigating the death of Thelma Todd, pursuing Frank Nitti, hobnobbing with Bill Veeck, and serving as bodyguard to Marilyn Monroe.