How many times can you spot the letter "o" in:
First serialized in the pulp magazine Black Mask (November 1928–February 1929), linked short stories connected with the enigmatic Gabrielle Leggett, who believes herself cursed; everyone around her seems to die.
The Dain Curse is infinitely superior in every way to the abysmal Red Harvest. I could give another star, but I wrote this review between two Hammetts, both of which I hated.
For a start, it’s a fair play detective story. The murderer is an effective surprise (although see reservations below), and there are clues.
A destructive fate pursues Gabrielle Leggett wherever she goes: it annihilates her home, penetrates into the new thought temple where she takes refuge, brings her wedding-trip to a tragic end and drives her to the verge of insanity. Following the girl’s amazing career by devious and unprecedented ways of his own, Mr. Hammett’s unequalled detective succeeds in vanquishing the curse that hangs over Gabrielle’s head and corners what is perhaps one of the most remarkable criminals in fiction.
New York Herald Tribune: More than competently narrated by a cop with a picturesque lingo. Recommended for its weird characters and really astonishing speed.
Walter Brooks, in The Outlook: We want to say right here that Mr. Hammett is our favourite detective story writer. … His knowledge of the ways of criminals and detectives, which has quite obviously not ben gained by reading the detective stories of other writers… We can think of only one story of the kind better than this second book of Mr Hammett’s and that is his first.
Sunday Express: An extremely good detective story of the sensational type.
Irish Statesman: The ingredients of this mystery tale are varied and rich. There is dope in it. There are half-a-dozen murders. There is a bomb explosion. There is the middle-aged detective who tells the story; he is a mine of common sense and his speech is a mine for the student of slang. There is a new religion with faked spirits. There is money, of course. The ingredients are stirred energetically and cause a kind of dizzy excitement in the person who partakes of them… The mixture is the literary equivalent of a soul-slaying cocktail.
Again, it was the plot here that delighted me — and I read this one fairly recently and so know that my positive impression is relatively reliable. Hammett managed a sort of portmanteau structure that should be beyond the simple rock-em-sock-em typecasting one would anticipate this style of book falling into, and I found that unexpected development quite marvellous.
Easily and by far Hammett’s weakest book. 3/5 is fair. I have read it twice, which is probably enough.
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There are 129 "o"s.
assistant