To each his own, but I seriously don't get the low ratings for this book. Maybe there's something wrong with me in the sense that I prefer well-written, older novels to much of what's on today's crime fiction shelves, but this book from the 1930s runs rings around a lot of newer stuff I've read recently. It's suspenseful, is a really good story, and, since I read mainly to discover what makes people tick or what drives people to make the choices they make, it also works nicely as a character study. Evidently, though, my high opinion of this novel isn't shared by a lot of readers, who in general give it an average overall rating mainly because of the plot. Well, this book is a prime example of what you can miss when plot and story arc are the main things on your mind.

For example, I've seen this novel labeled as a thriller, and I suppose there are a number of thriller-type elements, but I got much more of a noir sort of flavor from it -- the hapless Joe who's in the wrong place at the wrong time, looking for a way out of his predicament only to discover that he just may be trapped by fate and his own choices. It really doesn't take that long to figure out just how much the main character's life is spiraling out of control, along with the lives of those who fall within his immediate orbit. In this case, we have our main character caught smack in the middle of a collision course between the past and the present.

Both this book and the 1935 German film I watched earlier today are definite yesses. Trust me, there's nothing average about this book at all -- it's another fine example of an old book that has been largely forgotten, and thanks to Pushkin Vertigo, it's now widely available. Once again I'll say that I do understand that crime from 1930s may not be everyone's cup of tea, but I seem to be encountering a lot of these old novels that are really, really good and which definitely ought to be part of every serious crime fiction reader's repertoire.

Recommended to all crime readers, but most especially to readers who love these old books as much as I do.

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