Everyone’s history deserves to be told. One of the principal reactions I had to David Grann’s new book, about a series of heinous murders committed against wealthy Osage Indians in the 1920s, was incredulity that I had never heard even an inkling about this terrible chapter in American history. The story, in brief: after being forced out of their original homeland the Osage Indians found themselves on a rocky, arid plain in Oklahoma that was given to them essentially because no one else wanted it. […]
Murder from the Inside Out
Ross Macdonald’s plots are just as intricate as Raymond Chandler’s, but somehow he manages to tie it all together with no loose ends. (Who did kill that chauffeur anyway?) The only way I can imagine Macdonald putting together his mysteries is by writing a straightforward novel without a detective, then putting all the events in the wrong order for his detective, ex-cop Lew Archer to discover one at a time. All the staples of the Lew Archer series are on display here, the post-war California […]
The Loneliest Man on the Planet
I’d never heard of this book before stumbling upon it at the Strand last week. Its cover hails it as a lost classic of the atomic age and while the “lost” part seems indisputable, the “classic” descriptor is up for debate. Stephen Decatur Smith narrates his chance happening on perhaps the biggest story of the century, the fact that no new babies are being born. It seems as though a nuclear accident has rendered the male population of the world entirely sterile. Humanity’s future looks […]
Urban Decay
The improbably-named Johnny Weather hitchhikes into his unnamed hometown for the first time in years only to find that his father is dead and a stepmother he’s never met has inherited everything. Even worse is that his father’s murder remains unsolved due to a corrupt political machine and a compliant police department. Taking matters into his own fists, Weather brawls and shoots his way to a solution, plunging further and further into the rotten core of the city his father helped begrime. This is another […]
You Said You Were An Actress
I’ve apparently decided to read all of Ross Macdonald’s works this year (stay tuned) which means diving into his non-Archer novels. The Ferguson Affair hardly misses the pugnacious Lew Archer, with attorney Bill Gunnarson making for a suitable investigator. If Gunnarson seems to go an awfully long way for his client it’s an acceptable stretching of artistic license. Gunnarson is a private attorney asked to represent a young nurse caught trying to sell stolen jewelry. When he tries to verify her story about being given […]
A Dame to Kill For
My general rule of thumb is that “lost” novels should stay that way, but I’m glad I made an exception for the final novel of James M. Cain, published many years after the author’s death. Like the best of Cain’s novels it features people who find themselves in desperate circumstances. Cain’s characters are trapped by lust or greed and willing to go beyond the bounds of traditional morality to satisfy their desires. The Cocktail Waitress is narrated by Joan Medford, the title character. Left impoverished […]
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