
by Dorothy Hughes
Rating: ★★★★½
Publication Date: January 1, 1947
Genre: mystery: golden age (1920-1949), noir
Pages: 206
Project: a century of crime
Postwar Los Angeles is a lonely place where the American Dream is showing its seamy underside—and a stranger is preying on young women. The suggestively named Dix Steele, a cynical vet with a chip on his shoulder about the opposite sex, is the LAPD's top suspect. Dix knows enough to watch his step, especially since his best friend is on the force, but when he meets the luscious Laurel Gray—a femme fatale with brains—something begins to crack. The basis for extraordinary performances by Humphrey Bogart and Gloria Grahame in the 1950 film version of the book, In a Lonely Place tightens the suspense with taut, hard-boiled prose and stunningly undoes the conventional noir plot.
I read this one at the end of March, 2023. I was lucky enough to score a copy of the Library of America edition of Women Crime Writers of the 1940’s for my kindle when it was on sale for $2.99. My edition contains: Laura, by Vera Caspary; The Horizontal Man by Helen Eustis; In a Lonely Place by Dorothy Hughes and The Blank Wall by Elisabeth Sanxay. I have read Laura and In a Lonely Place so far.
In a Lonely Place was also adapted for a well-regarded noir film in 1950, starring Humphrey Bogart. I’ve never seen it, although I understand that the film deviates substantially from the book. I had planned to pair the film with the book, but never managed to do it.
I highly recommend the book. It feels like it was groundbreaking – noir written by a woman, where we spend the entire book inside of the head of the killer, during a time when women were expected to be purely decorative. Yet, somehow, it’s the women of the book who strike the sparks in the narrative. Dix Steele, the main character, is a void.
I have that book, too. Do you have both volumes? The stories you mentioned are in the 1940s volume, but there is also one for the 1950s.
I do have both volumes!
Fun awaits!