Miss Hard-Boiled, by Jane Dixon (1930)

An illustration from the newspaper serial of Miss Hard-Boiled. In my research into the source texts (novels, plays, magazine stories) of Hollywood’s earliest sound films — the Pre-Code era, as it’s usually referred to — I have amassed stacks of cheaper hardback novels published by Grosset & Dunlap. One of the fundamental forces that drives the publishing business is “another one like.” People who enjoy reading an Agatha Christie mystery will usually pick up another one (and another one and another one) because they can count on its being reliably similar in style, plot, characters, length, etc. From its founding in 1898 to its acquisition by Putnam’s in 1982, few American publishers stuck to the principle of “another one like” as steadfastly as Grosset & Dunlap. Grosset & Dunlap was the home of dozens of popular young adult series, including the Bobbsey Twins, the Hardy Boys, Nancy Drew, the Rover Boys, and Tom Swift. They were also a leading publisher of the sort of romances that…