77 Rue Paradis (originally published 1954) is a slight departure from other books written by Gil Brewer. Sure there's a dark and brooding leading man, wanton women, and pure pulp bit part characters (I'm thinking of a pair of secretaries moonlighting as armed guards in a top secret government facility who could easily have been created by Quentin Tarantino), but the essence of the story is espionage.
Baron is a guy who is down on his luck; forced to leave the country to hide from the media and his former colleagues following the sharp downfall of his plane building empire. He swears he's a victim of sabotage and that his planes weren't faulty - yet the deaths of many due to the less-than-standard aeronautical engineering of the planes produced by his company cast a long shadow of doubt.
The novel starts with Baron wallowing in self pity in a dark hotel room with an attractive 'lady of the night' with whom he's starting to fall in love with. After wading through a few pages of this, and an indulgent amount of introspection, Baron's lady friend heads out and is promptly kidnapped - followed shortly thereafter by Baron himself being kidnapped. From there, it's spy on spy action until the somewhat Bond-ish action packed good verses evil ending.
Some parts of 77 Rue Paradis were entertaining, others not so much but then again that's pretty standard when it comes to pulps; the kidnappings and broader complexities of the plot were a pleasant surprise but I'm not sure the ending worked - same for the all too easy manner by which Baron and co. found themselves just where they needed to be at the exact moment they needed to be there.
Overall, 77 Rue Paradis is a serviceable pulp and well worth reading for Gil Brewer completists.
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