Brighton Rock (novel) Brighton Rock (novel) Charles "Fred" Hale comes to Brighton on assignment to distribute cards anonymously for a newspaper competition (a variant of "Lobby Lud"; in this case, the name of the person to be spotted is "Kolley Kibber"). The antihero of the novel, Pinkie Brown, is a teenage sociopath and up-and-coming gangster. Hale had betrayed the former leader of the gang Pinkie now controls, by writing an article in the "Daily Messenger" about a slot machine racket for which the gang was responsible. Ida Arnold, a plump, kind-hearted and decent woman, is drawn into the action by a chance meeting
The Greene Murder Case mysterious footprints appearing in the snow which seem to have been made in an impossible way and by the suggestion that the paralyzed mother has been seen walking in the halls. Philo Vance reduces the facts of the case to just under a hundred paragraphs, sets them in order, and solves the case. "The Greene Murder Case" became the number four bestseller in the US during its first year of publication. "The Greene Murder Case" (1929) starred William Powell as Philo Vance. Another version, entitled "Night of Mystery" (1937), was based on "The Greene Murder Case" and starred Grant Richards