I can recommend Once A Widow, first of the 4 Dr Clinton
Shannon novels, highly but then again I am making a study of
the Lee Robert/Robert Martin stories. Not especially
hard-boiled or noir, it's no cozy either. A lot of death
surrounds the characters -- deaths of relatives that bring
about present circumstances, as well as murders and other
deaths occurring in the story.
What came to my mind when I read it a few months ago was
Sherwood Anderson's Grotesqueries read several decades ago:
small town people leading lives of quite desperation.
Martin/Roberts did work in a bank briefly in the 1930s and
lived at the YMCA a block away -- neither building stands
today.
I have found an actual incident in 1946 or so of someone
being stranded due in Lake Erie on a small island due to
sudden, fierce storm that may have inspired that portion of
the story.
There is usually a doctor in his stories -- his brother was a
doctor and possible also a coroner, and several of Martin's
closer friends were doctors.
All that aside, the novel moves right along and I hope you
enjoy it.
Jim Felton
RARA-AVIS home page: http://www.miskatonic.org/rara-avis/
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