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A review by bearofsand
Nightmare Town by Colin Dexter, William F. Nolan, Dashiell Hammett
adventurous
dark
mysterious
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
3.5
I've always been a big fan of Hammett's novels. The Maltese Falcon is probably in my top five books of all time. So needless to say, I was quite excited when I started this compilation of short stories. And we start off with a bang! Nightmare Town is a great little novella. I'd argue it's the best story in this whole collection.
It doesn't exactly go downhill from there, there are some other gems in here (A Man Called Spade, Too Many Have Lived, etc.). But we definitely have dessert before dinner in this instance.
I do think Nightmare Town's length lends to its excellence. I've discovered Hammett tends to do better when he has some room to write. The worst short stories in this collection tend to be the shortest of the bunch. It's the stories that have room to grow, room to introduce new characters, room to develop a noir-style plot that end up having the best effect.
Some of these 8 pagers start building up to something, only for there to be a half page left to sum it all up! Hammett then relies too heavily on exposition from one of the characters to reveal the big mystery, a common tactic of the genre but other parlor scenes do this more adroitly.
If you're a noir fan though, this book is highly recommended. There are a few duds in here but there's enough greatness to balance the scales.
It doesn't exactly go downhill from there, there are some other gems in here (A Man Called Spade, Too Many Have Lived, etc.). But we definitely have dessert before dinner in this instance.
I do think Nightmare Town's length lends to its excellence. I've discovered Hammett tends to do better when he has some room to write. The worst short stories in this collection tend to be the shortest of the bunch. It's the stories that have room to grow, room to introduce new characters, room to develop a noir-style plot that end up having the best effect.
Some of these 8 pagers start building up to something, only for there to be a half page left to sum it all up! Hammett then relies too heavily on exposition from one of the characters to reveal the big mystery, a common tactic of the genre but other parlor scenes do this more adroitly.
If you're a noir fan though, this book is highly recommended. There are a few duds in here but there's enough greatness to balance the scales.