Curt's Read-Bag: Pick-up
Title: Pick-up
By: Charles Willeford (Random House, 131 pp.)
Concerning: A failed painter turned diner counter-man takes up with a beautiful, self-destructive alcoholic. The reader’s early suspicion “No good will come of this” is confirmed many times over by a downward spiral that never seems to hit bottom.
Quote: “I had a fresh package of king-sized cigarettes furnished by the Red Cross and I was set for another pleasant day. We were not allowed to keep matches and it was inconvenient t get a light from the orderly every time I wanted to smoke, but I knew I couldn’t have everything.” (Partly I like that just because the idea of the Red Cross providing cigarettes reflects social changes in the past 50 years.)
Verdict: Very good. Charles Willeford wrote the Hoke Mosely novels, which include Miami Blues, which was adapted into a film with great performances from Alec Baldwin and Jennifer Jason Leigh. This is more of a nihilistic noir novel about, as the dust jacket says, “two lost souls adrift in San Francisco’s lower depths.” I was impressed. Some noir stories amount to cautionary tales or morality plays in which the evil characters get their just desserts. Pick-up is a little more complicated, because it depicts character who have no options (or at least won’t allow themselves to perceive their options), yet can find no respite even in (an early) suicide attempt. It’s like, not only is life cruel and meaningless, it won’t let you off the hook. The book’s next-to-the-last line also reveals a twist that, in retrospect, “explains” a lot of stuff from earlier. I spoiled myself by accident, but was glad I did.
Also: This is one of five short novels in the volume Crime Novels: American Noir of the 1950s. There's something funny about reading books that were published as cheap, lurid paperbacks in a fancy literary hardback edition with extensive Notes on the Text and even one of those built-in book-mark tassels. I've already read two of its other novels: The Killer Inside Me by Jim Thompson and The Talented Mr. Ripley by Patricia Highsmith, and will probably read the other two back-to-back with Pick-up.
By: Charles Willeford (Random House, 131 pp.)
Concerning: A failed painter turned diner counter-man takes up with a beautiful, self-destructive alcoholic. The reader’s early suspicion “No good will come of this” is confirmed many times over by a downward spiral that never seems to hit bottom.
Quote: “I had a fresh package of king-sized cigarettes furnished by the Red Cross and I was set for another pleasant day. We were not allowed to keep matches and it was inconvenient t get a light from the orderly every time I wanted to smoke, but I knew I couldn’t have everything.” (Partly I like that just because the idea of the Red Cross providing cigarettes reflects social changes in the past 50 years.)
Verdict: Very good. Charles Willeford wrote the Hoke Mosely novels, which include Miami Blues, which was adapted into a film with great performances from Alec Baldwin and Jennifer Jason Leigh. This is more of a nihilistic noir novel about, as the dust jacket says, “two lost souls adrift in San Francisco’s lower depths.” I was impressed. Some noir stories amount to cautionary tales or morality plays in which the evil characters get their just desserts. Pick-up is a little more complicated, because it depicts character who have no options (or at least won’t allow themselves to perceive their options), yet can find no respite even in (an early) suicide attempt. It’s like, not only is life cruel and meaningless, it won’t let you off the hook. The book’s next-to-the-last line also reveals a twist that, in retrospect, “explains” a lot of stuff from earlier. I spoiled myself by accident, but was glad I did.
Also: This is one of five short novels in the volume Crime Novels: American Noir of the 1950s. There's something funny about reading books that were published as cheap, lurid paperbacks in a fancy literary hardback edition with extensive Notes on the Text and even one of those built-in book-mark tassels. I've already read two of its other novels: The Killer Inside Me by Jim Thompson and The Talented Mr. Ripley by Patricia Highsmith, and will probably read the other two back-to-back with Pick-up.