A Swell-Looking Babe by Jim Thompson (1954)

A night-shift hotel bellboy's troubled past collides with his difficult present.

Mystery Review: A Swell-Looking Babe is a misleading title, but not in the way readers might think. Bill "Dusty" Rhodes is just a night shift bellboy, a college dropout, caught in a red-baiting lawsuit, has no interest in women, an invalid father, a dead mother, and things are about to get a whole lot worse. He's not a bad guy so much as just a not very nice guy with a certain moral ambivalence. It's hard to root for him to get out of his mess. He's about to make a few mistakes, have a few accidents, and he's soon spinning into the vortex of oblivion. The more he struggles to get out of his predicament the tighter the coils entwine about him. While passable, A Swell-Looking Babe is not as good as some of Jim Thompson's other books, lacking a strong narrative through line, the usual obsessive menace, or any characters to care about. He also throws in certain psychological elements as a wild card. The reader, as does Dusty, gets tossed about from one plot point to another without being too certain what's going on at any given time until all embroils in an existential ending. Thompson fans will certainly find something to enjoy in A Swell-Looking Babe, but it won't make too many top-ten lists.  [3★]

Slaves of Solitude by Patrick Hamilton (1947)

An aging spinster tries to survive the Second World War in a boarding house outside of London.

Book Review: Slaves of Solitude is about the loneliness that leads to hopelessness, so that eventually one no longer attempts to escape the solitary island, to take action, to try. Hamilton goes deep into the human condition focused on our Miss Roach (a Kafka reference?). The various characters, residents of the boarding house, have their own layers of personality, but all play off Miss Roach as seen through her multifaceted eyes and fear of life. She's sensitive to the point of paranoia. She has too little skin between her and the world. Although she tries to stay safely insulated to avoid hurt, the rough and tumble of life (all during war-time) somehow pokes through in the forms of a German expat, an American soldier, and an old bully of an English pensioner. The etiquette of the boarding house is shown in stark relief against the chaos of the war-time pub culture. Miss Roach dwells and obsesses about comments, actions, circumstances, soon becomes caught inside her own head. She doesn't act the way the reader might, she's not highly intelligent or educated or traveled, has led a limited life. But as do most people she does the best she can at the time. Which is the point. Other people do not do as any other person might, they do their best and do what their life up to that point has led them to do, and that action continues to lead them down their path. She can only follow her own path, not that which the reader would choose for her. For a novel about lonely Britons, Slaves of Solitude is a riveting, quick read with a fair coating of humor over its serious heart, laughing to keep from crying. I suspect many readers will find it easy to identify with Miss Roach. I'd never heard of Patrick Hamilton (1904-62) until I watched a film, the demented Hangover Square (1945), on late night television and saw he was the author of the source novel. Then I found Slaves of Solitude, a (to me) lost masterpiece. Most lost classics aren't. Whether songs, books, or movies most championed obscurities are unknown for a reason. Patrick Hamilton is the rare exception. Hamilton was a classic troubled author who wrote the original works on which the films Rope, Gaslight, as well as Hangover Square were based. All three reeking of paranoia,  murder, and madness. All redolent of loss.  [5★]

The Necklace of Pearls by Dorothy L. Sayers (1933)

A marvelous pearl necklace is stolen at a Christmas party.

Story Review: "The Necklace of Pearls" is saved only by the wonderful writing. As a mystery it's something of  a dud. Lord Peter Wimsey is invited, the hostess needing an eligible bachelor, to a wealthy family's traditional Christmas party during which, of course, a necklace is stolen. The mystery is soon solved in uninspiring fashion. The writing, however, is sparkling, giving a sense of the time, the spirit of the party, and of those who frequented such affairs. My thought is that the talented Sayers really just wanted to write a Christmas story and tacked on the mystery to fit into the Wimsey oeuvre and make it salable. An enjoyable read that fizzles rather than flares.  [3★]

Shadow Boxer by Eddie Muller (2003)

A boxing columnist gets dragged into the murder trial of the man who framed him, and then gets dragged even deeper.

Mystery Review: Shadow Boxer is the second novel featuring Billy Nichols, a San Francisco boxing writer in the 1940's. Written by the host of Noir Alley on the Turner Classic Movies channel, Eddie Muller is an acknowledged expert in film noir, writing several books on the genre. This, his second novel, is historical fiction set in the heart of the first noir era, 1948. Shadow Boxer is well and cleverly written. It's entertaining, featuring a decent Chinatown-type story with some good patter. Almost too good, too clean, too perfect, without the rough edges seen in novels of the time. Although set in the 40's it doesn't really have the feel of an old hardboiled detective novel, too smart and too slick. Of course our hero is not a detective, nor particularly hardboiled. As Billy Nichols is a boxing columnist (as was Muller's father) I kept thinking at some key moment he was going to pull a right hook out of left field, but nope. Shadow Boxer just didn't quite touch the heart, didn't stir my emotions. I may well be missing something, however, as the story apparently follows directly after the narrative in Muller's first novel, The Distance (2002), which I haven't read. But for which I'm now scouring the charity shops.  [3½★]

Crossed Skis by Carol Carnac (1952)

A murder in London leads to the investigation of an English skiing party in Austria.

Mystery Review: Crossed Skis is the perfect book for that mystery-loving skier in your life, while still accessible to non-skiers. Part of the excellent British Library Crime Classics series, the story bounces back and forth between the initial investigation in London and the holiday celebrations of the 16-strong British skiing party in Austria, until the two lines converge in a worthy climax. In Crossed Skis Carnac eagerly shares her vibrant enthusiasm for the sport while providing intense and detailed descriptions of the discomforts of traveling across the Continent, the difficulties of changing money, and the restrictions posed by the occupied countries of Cold War Europe and the recent iron curtain. There's a persistent undercurrent of dislike for foreigners and the Irish in particular (exemplified by the single Irish member of the party) come in for heavy slagging with nary a mention of 800 years of oppression. The mystery aspects of Crossed Skis are a well done police procedural with an interesting discussion of profiling the perp. On the other hand, there are too many characters to follow comfortably (I gave up) and the number of suspects soon becomes unwieldy. This is my second book by the highly prolific Edith Caroline Rivett (1894-1958), better known as Carol Carnac or E.C.R. Lorac among other pseudonyms. One small note, "skiing" is written as "ski-ing" throughout suggesting that an accepted spelling for the growing sport hadn't yet been established.  [3★]

The Walls of Jericho by Rudolph Fisher (1928)

In Harlem, a lawyer moves into a white neighborhood as a furniture mover looks for love.

Book Review: The Walls of Jericho is light on plot but rich in character, atmosphere, and color. The first novel by Rudolph Fisher (1897-1934), a member of the Harlem Renaissance, who provides an energetic and insightful view of the black mecca of America. The lengthy centerpiece of the novel is the Annual Costume Ball, which all Harlem, high and low (literally), attends. As well as showing the caste system in Harlem, Fisher presents the good guys and bad guys of black society and the mostly clueless white visitors. The protagonist hates white people and the white people want to help black folks in the worst way. Climate change and 1619 get mentioned along the way -- everything old is new again. Comic relief and subplot in The Walls of Jericho is provided by BFFs Bubber and Jinx, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern in different clothes. The characters reappeared as suspects in Fisher's later mystery novel, The Conjure-Man Dies (1932), and in a short story, "One Month's Wages" (2008), generously included as a bonus in this volume by the British branch of HarperCollins. The story is enjoyable, and includes a version of a scene in Conjure-Man. In addition to a Preface and Introduction, this volume also contains "An Introduction to Contemporary Harlemese, Expurgated and Abridged," which includes such words as "belly-rub," "dickty," "K.M.," "salty dog," and "tight." Curious whether Fisher aimed this novel more at a black or white audience, I found The Walls of Jericho to be quick, entertaining, and educational all at the same time.  [4★]

Pnin by Vladimir Nabokov (1957)

A Russian immigrant struggles to find his place in American academia.

Book Review: Pnin is a story made of incidents found in the middle of the life of a fumbling Russian émigré of the same name trying to make it in American academia. Sweet, gentle, sad, subtle, warm, loving. Moments found during a difficult time but the reader hopes he will survive. Intelligently written with wonderfully detailed descriptions. Little plot, more of a soft water color of a novel. Bittersweet -- pity the poor immigrant but admire his endless resilience and capacity for humor and friendship. Brief moments of intense sorrow, sometimes enormous and at other times quite small, that grab the reader's heart no matter what. Multilingually literary, but a simple story that should be read slowly. Historical moments of the time come into focus briefly, then are eclipsed by Pnin's life. What's occurring in the outer world isn't the subject, more a counterpoint to what's happening to our hero. And it's all too brief. Nabokov only gives us sketches and then is off sketching something other. Despite being repeatedly and cruelly abused, exploited, and manipulated by his ex-wife, Pnin keeps helping her and Nabokov doesn't make us despise Pnin for letting himself be used, but instead respect him for his generosity and ability to love. This reaches its apotheosis in his fondness for her son, Victor, which is the fleeting heart of the book. We want to know more about his interaction with his stepson in this anti-Lolita, we want to share the warmth and depth of their relationship, but Nabokov has already moved on somewhere else. This could have, should have, been the center of the novel, but it's not. For me Pnin was incomplete, undeveloped, too little. Many people think the novel is hilarious, but for me it was just a few chuckles because the humor seemed literal, so much of it was believable and real. A marvel of good writing (perhaps over my head), but too minimal a story.  [3★]