Jul 26, 2026 · 1 hr 48 min · 11 segments
Paul Abbott, co-host of Hark! The 87th Precinct Podcast, joins me to provide an overview of the books in the police procedural series by Ed McBain, as well as some of their film and TV versions too…
So, so the 87th Precinct series is this series of novels and a few short stories, and I suppose a couple of novellas, and technically-
And Ed McBain was a pseudonym for Evan Hunter, and Evan Hunter was a writer who was originally an Italian American, actually born Salvatore Lombino.
And, uh, at some point he decided, uh, I think, was it an editor who said to him that he'd probably have trouble selling fiction as Sal Lombino or S.A. Lombino, and so he had his name legally changed to one of the pseudonyms he was already using, right, which was Evan Hunter.
So, uh, Evan Hunter went from being literally just a pen name to being his name, and the family ...
His kids didn't know any other name, so the Lombino name for him just was dead in the water, and he, he wouldn't use it, he wouldn't respond to it, so ...
It's, it's a big part of his psychological makeup that he can't shake off, and it was asked about for his entire life, and he addresses it quite often in the books for someone who doesn't wanna talk about it, so [laughs]
[laughs] I know, I'm always fascinated by, and we'll, we'll talk about it a bit later because it's all the kind of, uh, rubbish pseudonyms he has for the deaf man and things like that, which are like El Sordo being my particular favorite.
Have you read a lot of his sort of, um, pseudonymous work, you know, the outside of the two names, uh, the kind of Curt Cannon type stuff and things like that?
Um, a fair bit because I've been making an effort to try and collect all the short stories that p- crop up in things like Manhunt Magazine.
And I haven't read all of them, but I have been, as I s- mentioned, my sort of collector's nature is try to find them all.
So, so the 87th Precinct series is this series of novels and a few short stories, and I suppose a couple of novellas, and technically-
And Ed McBain was a pseudonym for Evan Hunter, and Evan Hunter was a writer who was originally an Italian American, actually born Salvatore Lombino.
And, uh, at some point he decided, uh, I think, was it an editor who said to him that he'd probably have trouble selling fiction as Sal Lombino or S.A. Lombino, and so he had his name legally changed to one of the pseudonyms he was already using, right, which was Evan Hunter.
So, uh, Evan Hunter went from being literally just a pen name to being his name, and the family ...
His kids didn't know any other name, so the Lombino name for him just was dead in the water, and he, he wouldn't use it, he wouldn't respond to it, so ...
It's, it's a big part of his psychological makeup that he can't shake off, and it was asked about for his entire life, and he addresses it quite often in the books for someone who doesn't wanna talk about it, so [laughs]
[laughs] I know, I'm always fascinated by, and we'll, we'll talk about it a bit later because it's all the kind of, uh, rubbish pseudonyms he has for the deaf man and things like that, which are like El Sordo being my particular favorite.
Have you read a lot of his sort of, um, pseudonymous work, you know, the outside of the two names, uh, the kind of Curt Cannon type stuff and things like that?
Um, a fair bit because I've been making an effort to try and collect all the short stories that p- crop up in things like Manhunt Magazine.
And I haven't read all of them, but I have been, as I s- mentioned, my sort of collector's nature is try to find them all.
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