Mystery Review: Woman in the Dark is subtitled "a novel of dangerous romance." I guess. More a long short story than a novel (or even novella) and the romance is on the rough and abrupt side, but what does one expect in 70 generously margined pages. Hammett's protagonists seem tossed on the sea of fate, knowing that there's little about life they can change so it's barely worth even trying, though they do. His heroes mostly resign themselves to accepting what comes, however painful it might be. The Ned Beaumont kidnapping scene in The Glass Key is the epitome of this, in which he calmly accepts beating after beating like a turtle pushing against a wall. Our protagonist here has less to say and do than most, but the titular "Woman in the Dark," a German immigrant (apparently not a refugee) rises to the occasion. And the bad guys are pretty bad. The story is too short though, really needed to be expanded and developed, so ends up just a quick bite to enjoy and move on. Woman in the Dark was also a 1934 film with Fay Wray (the scream queen of King Kong fame). The movie is no better or worse than the book, but at least fleshes out the skeleton presented here. [3★]
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