as “Edgar Box,” and this one, his first stab at crime fiction, proof perhaps that the cheese stands alone. Of course, Gore Vidal wasn’t a pseudonym, or at least not much of one - Gore was a family name, and anyway, when this potboiler came out way back in 1953, it was published by “Cameron Kay.” After the homophobic furor unleashed following the publication of The City and the Pillar (1948), the suddenly black-listed Vidal, struggling to make ends meet, pumped out four pseudonymous crime novels, three well-regarded novels featuring a PR flack turned pseudo-P.I. The Cameron Kay never was.Despite the obvious pen name (Really? “Gore”?), this guy Vidal looks to be a pretty promising pulp writers. But in the wake of criticism for the scandalous content of his third novel, The City and the Pillar, Vidal turned to writing crime fiction under pseudonyms: three books as “Edgar Box” and one as “Cameron Kay.” The Edgar Box novels were subsequently republished under his real name.

In 1953, Vidal had already begun writing the works that would launch him to the top ranks of American authors and intellectuals. The author of twenty-three novels, five plays, three memoirs, numerous screenplays and short stories, and well over two hundred essays, he received the National Book Award in 1993. Gore Vidal was one of America’s greatest and most controversial writers. One part Casablanca and one part torn-from-the-headlines tabloid reportage, this novel also offers a startling glimpse of Egypt in turmoil-written over half a century ago, but as current as the news streaming from the streets of Cairo today. By turns mischievous and deadly serious, Vidal tells the story of a man caught up in events bigger than he is, a down-on-his-luck American hired to smuggle an ancient relic out of Cairo at a time when revolution is brewing and heads are about to roll. Lost for more than 60 years and overflowing with political and sexual intrigue, Thieves Fall Out provides a delicious glimpse into the mind of legendary writer Gore Vidal in his formative years.

Synopsis: An American smuggler in Egypt finds himself at the mercy of killers, femme fatales, and an escalating revolution-a lost pulp crime novel from one of the legends of the genre

Thieves Fall Out by Cameron Kay