Blind Man with a Pistol
New York: William Morrow, 1969. First Edition. 8vo, pp. 240. Pushed at spine tips, else near fine in a near fine dust jacket with only a small crease to the top edge of the rear panel. Item #1380
The last completed novel in the Harlem Detective series finds Grave Digger Jones and Coffin Ed Johnson investigating a murder against a backdrop of Black Power demonstrations and Brotherhood marches, a setting that exposes the fundamental futility of their position—two Black detectives enforcing a white legal system in a community that the same system has systematically destroyed. In his earlier novels, Himes balanced the inherent violence with dark comedy. Blind Man with a Pistol tips toward chaos instead, its plot deliberately fragmenting into a series of disconnected incidents that refuse to resolve, a formal choice that reflects the author's conclusion that Harlem's conditions were structural, not criminal, and therefore beyond the reach of any detective. You should read this because Himes tells his readers, without flinching, that the detective novel's promise of order and resolution was never meant for Black America.
Price: $150.00