My favorite mysteries.THE MALTESE FALCON by Dashiell Hammett, published in 1930, is the template for many hardboiled stories that appeared over the decades since its inception. The tough, cynical private eye that may not be as crooked as he seems, the intricate plot, the femme fatale, the outsized out·size n. 1. An unusual size, especially a very large size. 2. A garment of unusual size. adj. also out·sized Unusually large, weighty, or extensive. Adj. 1. villains, the object of lust and desire--it's all here. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Native Son by Richard Wright is arguably a sociological crime novel. It deals with murder born out of self-hate and racism as the work burrows deep within the tortured psyche of its main character, Bigger Thomas. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Daddy Cool was written by Donald Goines, who was a pimp, hustler, thief and junkie, as documented in the biography Low Road: The Life and Legacy of Donald Goines by Eddie B. Allen, and corroborated cor·rob·o·rate tr.v. cor·rob·o·rat·ed, cor·rob·o·rat·ing, cor·rob·o·rates To strengthen or support with other evidence; make more certain. See Synonyms at confirm. by a friend of mine who edited and rewrote some of Goines' oft-times incomplete and incoherent manuscripts at Holloway House. Goines wrote his novels while still on the needle--nonetheless, Daddy Cool, about a ruthless hitman trying to save his hardheaded hard·head·ed adj. 1. Stubborn; willful. 2. Realistic; pragmatic. hard  head daughter from falling into the "life," is Goines at his primitive auteur auteur (ōtör`), in film criticism, a director who so dominates the film-making process that it is appropriate to call the director the auteur, or author, of the motion picture. best. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Donald Westlake writing as Richard Stark, began a series of books in the early '60s that are now underway again in this century. The Parker novels feature a cold-blooded professional thief and killer named Parker who is the epitome of an existentialist ex·is·ten·tial·ism n. A philosophy that emphasizes the uniqueness and isolation of the individual experience in a hostile or indifferent universe, regards human existence as unexplainable, and stresses freedom of choice and responsibility for the nihilist ni·hil·ism n. 1. Philosophy a. An extreme form of skepticism that denies all existence. b. A doctrine holding that all values are baseless and that nothing can be known or communicated. 2. surviving in a bleak and unforgivable world of other killers and cutthroats. I'd recommend The Man With the Getaway Face, Butcher's Moon and Comeback. Actors from Lee Marvin to Jim Brown have played interpretations of this character in movies. Women sometimes get overlooked when it comes to hardboiled noir fiction, but Dorothy B. Hughes Dorothy Belle Hughes (1904-May 6, 1993) was a U.S. crime writer and critic. Born Dorothy Belle Flanagan in Kansas City, Missouri, she studied journalism and after graduating worked in that field before becoming a mystery writer. wrote In a Lonely Place, with a force that gave her characters and settings a hard unsentimental glitter. Also check out her Expendable Man, written in the early '60s which features a male Black doctor as the protagonist. And of course, there are works of Jim Thompson. Nobody wrote messed-up people in a terse, economical style like he did in such novels as The Getaway (so much harder than either film version). The Grifters, Pop. 1280, The Killer Inside Me, and more. |
|
Printer friendly
Cite/link
Email
Feedback
Reader Opinion