"In an auspicious event for mystery readers, Syndicate is reprinting all 12 of Joseph Hansen’s pioneering Dave Brandstetter novels. ‘Fadeout,’ the first in the series featuring the comfortably gay World War II vet and L.A. insurance investigator, was published in 1970. As Michael Nava points out in his insightful new introduction, that’s when gay sex was a criminal act in 49 of the 50 states. Through grit and sheer talent, Hansen found a wide audience… Crime fiction fans who don’t know Hansen’s work are in for a treat."
—The Washington Post
Covid, paper shortages, and myriad other factors have made for a long road to restoration for these incredible books. But for something as excellent as this series, which has already spent five decades fighting a headwind of bigotry, a little ‘rona and logistics is hardly going to hold it back.
We are very pleased to say that the first three novels of Joseph Hansen’s landmark Dave Brandstetter mystery series are back on shelves and already getting some wonderful attention. You can read about the reissues in the Washington Post or via excellent reviews via the New York Journal of Books of Fadeout and Death Claims.
Paperback copies are available wherever books are sold and eBooks can be purchased from your preferred digital retailer. More information about the first three Dave Brandstetter novels, including retail links, can be found below.
Welcome back, Dave.
“Joseph Hansen is not only one of America’s best mystery writers, he is a great American writer. Period. Full stop.”
—Michael Nava
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With a New Foreword by Michael Nava
Published fifty years ago, a time when being gay was illegal in 49 out of 50 states, Joseph Hansen’s first Dave Brandstetter novel shattered stereotypes and redefined the Private Eye novel as we know it.
Five decades after its original landmark publication, Joseph Hansen’s Fadeout is as fresh and important as ever. Preceded only by a handful of gay protagonists in crime fiction, Hansen’s Dave Brandstetter, a ruggedly handsome World War II vet with a quick wit, faultless moral compass, and endless confidence, shattered stereotypes and won over a large reading audience, a feat previously considered impossible for queer fiction.
Set in the mid-1960s, Fadeout centers on the disappearance of a southern California radio personality named Fox Olson. A failed writer, Olson finally found success as a beloved folksinger and wholesome country raconteur with a growing national audience. The community is therefore shocked when Olson’s car is found wrecked, having been driven off a bridge and swept away in a fast-moving arroyo on a rainy night. A life insurance claim is filed by Olson’s widow and the company holding the policy sends their best man to investigate. The problem is that Olson’s body was never found. Not in the car. Not further down the river. As Dave Brandstetter begins his investigation he quickly finds that none of it adds up.
"I can only applaud the republication of Joseph Hansen's Dave Brandstetter books. I've increasingly come to regard the phrase 'an important writer of crime fiction' as oxymoronic, but if one's going to use the label, Hansen's not an unreasonable bearer of it."
—Lawrence Block
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Death claims investigator Dave Brandstetter enters a world thespians and booksellers as he uncovers the true story behind the death of a rare book dealer in this noir-spun masterpiece of California crime fiction.
Since a burning accident that left him painfully disfigured, John Oats, a well-liked collectible book dealer, has been self-isolating at his beach house in Arena Blanca, California. An avid swimmer, John Oats had taken to night swimming to hide his injuries from daytime beachgoers. When his body is found one morning smashed against the rocks at the treacherous point near the house, the authorities rule it “Death by Misadventure.”
Insurance companies don’t much care for verdicts like that and therefore Medallion Insurance, the policy holder for Oats’s substantial life insurance policy, sends out its best investigator, Dave Brandstetter, to poke holes in the story. The night Oats died there was a dangerous storm along the coast, and Brandstetter finds it hard to believe that the bookseller, a lifelong swimmer, would have gone out. As his investigation reveals more of John Oats’s sad story Brandstetter learns that the motives for murder are many.
But Brandstetter has his own problems to deal with. Still mourning the death of his partner, Rod, Dave is navigating his own twilight world of grief. His new lover, Doug, is also grieving, and the two men must come to a reckoning of whether their love is an ersatz stand-in for their lost partners or something more.
"The Brandstetter books are classics of the private eye genre... It's great to see them available again."
—Peter Robinson
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Love and money are the easy motives in the death of a California beachfront nightclub owner, but death claims investigator Dave Brandstetter is certain of one thing: the case is going to be far from easy and the police have it all wrong.
Rick Wendell wouldn’t hurt a flea. The big, jovial owner of the Hang Ten, a surfing-themed gay bay on the boardwalk, was loved by regulars and new arrivals alike. But Rick was found naked and dead, with a local hustler named Larry Johns standing over him, smoking gun in hand. Wendell’s death is ruled as a homicide and Johns is arrested. Everyone thinks it’s a simple open-and-shut case. Everyone except the death claims investigator, Dave Brandstetter.
Brandstetter, a homosexual himself, doesn’t make the same assumptions about the crime scene and easy story it tells. Larry Johns had enough time to escape had he wanted to. Not to mention Johns lacked any discernable motive, especially since the $200 in Wendell’s wallet was left untouched. In an investigation that takes him from sun-scorched hillside ranches to seedy boardwalk bars, Brandstetter gets to the bottom of a twisty mystery in this hardboiled and entertaining portrait of the ’70s gay culture by groundbreaking poet and award-winning crime writer Joseph Hansen.
