The Corpse Moved Upstairs

He was a slightly illegal detective, but that didn't deter him from jumping on the case, especially when a million dollars was at stake. Frank Gruber wrote several novels about Johnny Fletcher, and as a main character he was always getting into trouble seemingly at the drop of a hat. This time someone delivers to him a dead corpse in a trunk. Add to that Jill Thayer a beautiful and dangerous blonde--a cartoonist of all things; and a three hundred pound dealer in rare books, Langford; and a two timing wife, and a manager of a girlie movie theater, and you have the ingredients for a rapid paced, quick fisted old fashioned pot boiler--a film noir the industry calls them. And Frank Gruber wrote for the movies in this genre quite often, so he knows his way around a murder mystery. There is also a touch of humor in his work.