There used to be a mystery thread but I can't find it. In any case we need something more specific, or at least I do. I'm a fairly serious recreational noir-ista. Always with an eye for the overlooked master (who isn't?)
I'm soaking up Dorothy B. Hughes at the moment. I only knew her as the writer of In A Lonely Place, one of the last truly great noir movies of the classic era. It turns out it wasn't a one off. I ate up The Blackbirder, which is quite Eric Ambler-ish, and now I'm into Ride the Pink Horse which is more in the Hammett/Chandler groove.
Aside from being the only major female writer in the genre's early period I'm aware of, (Margaret Millar and others are more trad mystery writers) she's also the only one to consistently use Santa Fe as a location. I don't know the city at all, except by reputation. Hughes was a long time resident but, unlike Chandler whose views on Los Angeles were, if not affectionate at least circumspect, Hughes is pretty negative about her town. Oppressive, dirty, small-minded, maybe she's kinder toward it in other novels. Interestingly she isn't mentioned anywhere I can find as part of the internationally known arts community of Santa Fe, maybe she always felt an outsider. Anyway she's well worth checking out, and fortunately most of her stuff is still in print.
I'm soaking up Dorothy B. Hughes at the moment. I only knew her as the writer of In A Lonely Place, one of the last truly great noir movies of the classic era. It turns out it wasn't a one off. I ate up The Blackbirder, which is quite Eric Ambler-ish, and now I'm into Ride the Pink Horse which is more in the Hammett/Chandler groove.
Aside from being the only major female writer in the genre's early period I'm aware of, (Margaret Millar and others are more trad mystery writers) she's also the only one to consistently use Santa Fe as a location. I don't know the city at all, except by reputation. Hughes was a long time resident but, unlike Chandler whose views on Los Angeles were, if not affectionate at least circumspect, Hughes is pretty negative about her town. Oppressive, dirty, small-minded, maybe she's kinder toward it in other novels. Interestingly she isn't mentioned anywhere I can find as part of the internationally known arts community of Santa Fe, maybe she always felt an outsider. Anyway she's well worth checking out, and fortunately most of her stuff is still in print.
Comment