Reeves, Robert: Cellini Smith, Detective (1943); v1, 26 July 2021
 

Robert Reeves (1912-1945) was a pulp writer/novelist who died young, just as his series character Cellini Smith, an L.A. private eye, was taking off. This is the first Cellini Smith novel, published by Houghton Mifflin in 1943 as a hardback. It was reprinted, possibly a little condensed, by "Thrilling Mystery Novel" Magazine in January 1946, which is the source of this text. 48,000 words.

Smith, starting out and doing no business at all, is hired by the residents of a Hooverville hobo jungle to investigate the murder of one of their own. Having nothing else to do, and despite the tiny fee, he takes it on, which leads him into a complex world of lies, family conflict, strip joints and and gangsters.