
Day Keene
1903 – 1969
31 works on record
Biography
Born Gunard Hjerstedt in Chicago in 1903, Keene became an actor in repertory theater in the early 1920s. When his actor friends decided to try film, he instead turned to writing, and during the 1930s was a principal writer for the “Little Orphan Annie” radio show, as well as contributing to the pulps. After he moved to the west coast of Florida, he began writing paperback originals in the late 1940s, mostly fast-paced crime stories. An editor suggested that he change his name to something more American-sounding, which he did by adapting his mother’s maiden name, Daisy Keeney, to Day Keene. He was part of a lively community of writers (including Mickey Spillane, Harry Whittington, Gil Brewer, Talmage Powell, and John D. MacDonald), the competitive nature of which inspired some of the best hardboiled crime paperback original novels of the early 1950s, published by Gold Medal, Ace, Avon, Graphic, among others. Macfadden reprinted much of his work in the late 1960s. Unlike many mystery writers, he had only one recurring character -- the Hawaiian private detective, Johnny Aloha. By the 1960s, he had abandoned mysteries for mainstream novels. He died in North Hollywood in 1969.
Works

Zombies! Zombies! Zombies!

Exciting Short Stories
Notorious
Notorious
To Kiss or Kill
To Kiss or Kill

Wake Up to Murder

World Without Women
Bye, Baby Bunting
Bye, Baby Bunting

Strange Witness
C'est ma fête
C'est ma fête

Framed in guilt
Vive le marié !
Vive le marié !
Graine de cimetière
Graine de cimetière

Naked Fury
To kiss or kill
To kiss or kill

Carnival of death

The Brimstone Bed

Seed of doubt
Who has Wilma Lathrop?
Who has Wilma Lathrop?
The Big Kiss-Off
The Big Kiss-Off
Framed in Guilt
Framed in Guilt

Home Is The Sailor (Hard Case Crime)

Carnival of Doubt

The Passion Murders

Murder on the Side

Guns along the Brazos
Bye, baby bunting
Bye, baby bunting
Passage to Samoa
Passage to Samoa

Passage to Samoa

Framed in Guilt / My Flesh is Sweet

Homicidal lady

My Flesh Is Sweet