Carrie,
Re your comments below:
> So I know I'm taking aim at a sacred cow but
does
> anyone agree with me that
> Red Harvest doesn't hold up very well?
I certainly disagree, and quite strongly. I think it holds up
damned well. I read it for the first time in high school (not
all that long ago) and was riveted, and have been riveted
with every re-reading. I regard the Op is the best PI in
fiction, bar none, and HARVEST as his best novel-length
appearance, notwithstanding the fact that its serial
installments had to simultaneously stand as both independent
short stories and as chapters in a longer work. In fact, I
think the seams in HARVEST are very well-disguised; much more
than in the Op's other two book-length appearances, THE DAIN
CURSE and BLOOD MONEY, which were written under the same
constraints.
> Was this
> ever a popular success in
> novel form?
I don't have any sales figures handy, but it was his first
book sale (although BLOOD MONEY appeared first in magazine
form). I doubt he would have made a second if it hadn't've
sold at least middlingly well. It certainly wouldn't've
remained continuously in print since 1928 without some
initial commercial success.
Moreover, it wouldn't've inspired so many knock-offs, from
Brett Halliday's A TASTE FOR VIOLENCE to Robert B. Parker's
PALE KINGS AND PRINCES, if it hadn't've made some impact
right from the start. It was the grand-daddy of the
hard-boiled "Town Tamer" novels; in its way as influential
as, perhaps more influential than, THE MALTESE FALCON's
"quest object" and "turning your lover in" plots.
JIM DOHERTY
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