Binding: Paperback
Publisher: Bantam
Date Published: 1951
Description: Fair in Unknown jacket. Fair to Good Tight spine, cover and edge wear and no markings. A couple of pages have the bottom corners torn off. "Behind the scenes of New York crime...the life story of a criminal lawyer, his sensational career, and his own arrest and trial. " Complete and unabridged. Non-Fiction (#11800) read more
Edition: 2nd printing
Binding: Mass-market paperback
Publisher: Bantam Books, New York
Date Published: 1951
Description: Fair. No dust jacket as issued. (042009) Mass Market Paperback is in Fair+/Good condition with wear/tears at spine corners, wear at spine edges, 2 light creases in spine, light creases upper right corner, spine glue is very dry, bacov has diagonal... x, 403 p.; 18 cm. read more
Binding: Softcover
Publisher: Bantam S2471
Date Published: 1962
Description: VG- Paperback/The sensational true story of the famous criminal lawyer who defended over one hundred and twenty-five cases and never lost a trial! read more
Edition: No Edition Stated
Binding: Mass Market Paperback
Publisher: Bantam, New York
Date Published: 1946
Description: Very Good. 16mo-over 5¾"-6¾" tall. Some peeling to clear plastic on covers. Minor soiling. Hinges a little loose. Light shelf wear. Solid copy with clean pages. read more
Edition: First Mass Market Edition
Binding: Mass Market Paperback
Publisher: Bantam Books, New York
Date Published: 1946
Description: Good Condition. 4x7 Inches. This criminal lawyer's life story provides a behind the scenes look at some of New Yorks most notorious trials. read more
Edition: New Edition
Binding: Mass Market Paperback
Publisher: Bantam Books, New York
Date Published: 1962
Description: Poor/No Jacket. 8vo-over 7¾"-9¾" tall Clean Copy Spine has opened up at pages 224-225 but pages secure. Yellowed and blemished, uneven page block but print bright. read more
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Grosset & Dunlap, New York
Date Published: 1931
Description: Very Good. No Dj. 8vo-over 7¾"-9¾" Tall. Very Good, slight age discoloration to cover and endpapers, otherwise nice, text clean. Fallon is eloquently remembered in this vintage biography. Fowler brings the same linguistic precision and gift for description that are evident in "Shoe the Wild Mare" and "Solo in Tom-Toms. " read more
Edition: Second Printing
Binding: Cloth Hardcover
Publisher: Covice Friede Publishers
Date Published: 1931
Description: Good. No Jacket. Size: 8vo-over 7¾"-9¾" tall; Cloth worn through on cover edges and along spine. Chipping and fraying at top and bottom of spine. Pages 164-165 very browned where a paper was laid in. Browning pages from age. Erased pencil marking on front blank fly leaf. Text is clear. Binding is tight. read more
Edition: Apparent First Edition
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Grosset & Dunlap, New York
Date Published: 1931
Description: Very Good. Hardcover in very good condition. Dust jacket has some wear along edges and rubbing on covers. Actual book cover is mostly clean. Pages clean, but edges are age-toned. From front cover: 'The flamboyant story of Broadway's most colorful criminal lawyer-the power behind the scenes of the most notorious underworld trials of the tin-horn twenties. ' read more
"Gene Fowler was an early 20th Century journalist who branched slightly into movies and books. Back then newspaper men turned phrases, borrowed from poets. (Mencken, Runyon, Hecht, Leibling) It seems to me that only Murray Kempton of the moderns rates with the old-timers, in terms of style and intelligence.
The Great Mouthpiece is a true story of a talented but corrupt New York lawyer, William Fallon, told with sympathy. Some of the best writing in it concerns the gangster element which he represented and counseled, most vividly Arnold Rothstein, of 1919 Black Sox scandal fame, who would bet high-rolling rubes about what color the next Rolls-Royce that rolled past them on the corner of 42nd and Broadway would be, and hired a fleet of vehicles with chauffeurs in order to make sure he won every bet. He would bet on anything but the weather, as there was no fixing that. As a consequence "even the tiny metal suppositories that nudged him into the hereafter were etched with IOU's."
The Great Mouthpiece is a tale of the important and the sleazy in 1920's New York, with a huge cast of characters and some polished episodes regarding individual court cases which Fallon took on. Anyone who enjoys reading about this Great Gatsby/Jimmy Walker milieu would appreciate this angle. But what makes the book memorable is Fowler's style, the sieve through which this mash is put.
Trial attorneys looking for tricks will not do well to follow Fallon's modus operandi, giving his entire closing argument to one juror only, followed by an 11-1 hung jury. Eventually, he was accused of bribing a juror, for which Fowler convicts and forgives him.
Of Fowler's other book-length productions, I would recommend Minutes of the Last Meeting, the story of a small group of drinking buddies which included John Barrymore, W.C. Fields, and himself; and Good Night Sweet Prince, his biography of his friend Barrymore."
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