Re: RARA-AVIS: James Cain

From: Al Guthrie ( allanguthrie@ukonline.co.uk)
Date: 18 Oct 2002


----- Original Message -----

> Besides THE POSTMAN and DOUBLE INDEMNITY, are any of
> James Cain's other novels really good? I've kinda
> heard mixed reviews of SERENADE, THE MOTH, and MILDRED
> PIERCE. Oates dwells on them quite a bit in her essay
> on him in Madden's TOUGH GUY WRITERS OF THE THIRTIES,
> but somewhere else I read that none of his later works
> were on par with his first two novels.

Spot the pattern developing here... My favourite other Cain is THE BUTTERFLY, which you could term "incest noir". I also enjoyed SERENADE, which has a genuinely surprising take on homosexuality (for the time and genre). But, hey, I even enjoyed his historical noir PAST ALL DISHONOR, which is generally considered to be pretty awful, so perhaps you should take no notice of any of the above.

Al

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