Posted by Guillermo Maynez
on 4/7/2012, 13:45:06, in reply to "Re: Red Harvest"
189.253.204.233
Perhpas the part that remained a bit confusing to me was Reno's involvement in the plot. He is a character that appears relatively late in the story, and not a member of the original group of guys that have displaced old Willsson from power. But he is the one who actually kills Dinah. What's your take on it?
--Previous Message--
: Just finished the novel.
:
: I went through a phase in my teens of reading mostly
: historical fiction, then a long phase in my 20s of
: reading nothing but science fiction, but, like you,
: I've only sampled crime fiction and that only
: recently. I've read most of Sherlock Holmes, one
: Hammett (before this), one Chandler, and one Christie.
: I can see the appeal, and I would like to read more,
: but I couldn't take it as a steady diet the way some
: people (my wife, for one) do.
:
: Hammett's language and storytelling abilities are both
: impressive. His laconic and witty one-liners
: succinctly conjure up not only an image of what's
: happening, but the narrator's feelings. And in a
: complex story with more than a dozen significant
: characters I never felt lost, though there are a few
: gaps in my understanding of actions and motives.
:
: --Previous Message--
: ****SPOILERS****
:
: Throughout my reading life, I have never been a genre
: buff. That means, I have read some sci-fi, some
: horror, some historical novel, and so on, but not
: much. On crime fiction, I've read a couple of Agatha
: Christie, one Georges Simenon, and a few others I
: don't remember just now. Sherlock Holmes I've read
: basically everything, but I happen not to consider it
: genre fiction (whatever that means), but true, solid,
: good literature without adjectives. Now, I have wanted
: to read Hammett, Chandler, and the like, just for the
: fun of it. And now itīs the time to do it, in the
: company of such distinguished readers as my ReadLit
: friends.
:
: I enjoyed it, and it was what I expected, not less,
: not more. It's a fast read, though I sometimes had to
: go back a few pages to re-check some fact or name.
: That was fine. I liked the fact that there is no
: "happy" ending, and that tough guys remain
: tough. The Continental Op is no Brad Pitt, but a
: regular guy; not a superstar of detection, but a
: normal guy investigating sordid affairs without Crown
: jewels or State dignataries involved.
:
: Posionville is like any town in Mexico today, where
: all the establishment is corrupted: mayor, chief of
: police, businessmen, etc. Where do I hire a
: Continental Op to come clean this mess?? (Sigh).
:
: I loved the witticisms, the tough one-liners while
: bullets fly around; the hardened attitude towards any
: and all. "If you bring ethics to Poisonville,
: they'll get rusty". I feel tempted to date Dinah
: Brand, but frankly prefer to stay home watching old
: black-and-white crime movies...
:
:
:
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