A Rough Edges Rerun Review: Dirt Farm - Orrie Hitt

The protagonist of this fine yarn is Butch Hagen, a former carnival worker and truck driver who really prefers working on farms. He’s been shacking up in a small town with another former carny, the beautiful stripper Lucy Ellis, when he finds work on the very misnamed Friendly Farms, owned by brutal Clay Billings. Butch leaves Lucy to go work on the farm, where he finds that Billings has a beautiful niece named Candy. There’s another farmhand who has a beautiful redheaded girlfriend named Sherry, and on the next farm over there’s a hot-to-trot farmer’s daughter named Mae who happens to be a little underage . . .

Well, if you’ve read very many of these softcore sleaze novels, you’ll know how most of these plot elements are going to intertwine. And if you’re read much of Orrie Hitt’s work, you’ll find some of his familiar themes in DIRT FARM. But there are several things about this one that make it an excellent novel and well worth reading. For one, Hitt’s writing is really smooth and fast in DIRT FARM. He was a master at keeping the reader flipping the pages and this book is a prime example of that. For another, he throws in a noirish crime element reminiscent of James M. Cain and then proceeds to milk it for all the suspense it’s worth. Despite the predictability of some of the plot, I really didn’t have any idea how this book was going to end, and that’s rare. And finally, Hitt was among the best ever at writing about the desperation that fills most people, even the seemingly successful ones. Everybody in a Hitt novel wants something, needs something, is missing something. A lucky few find whatever it is that they’re seeking, but plenty of others don’t.

DIRT FARM isn’t as personal a book as some of Hitt’s other novels, so you don’t get his digressions about censorship and government, and not much about morality. But it reads like the wind and tells a compelling, if slightly formulaic, story. I had a great time reading it and recommend it for fans of hardboiled sleaze in general and Orrie Hitt in particular.

(This post originally appeared on August 31, 2009. I'm a little surprised that in the years since, DIRT FARM hasn't been reprinted. It's a good one.)

Review: The Pawn - J.E. Macdonnell

I think it’s safe to say that I’ve gotten hooked on this series of World War II naval adventures by J.E. Macdonnell. THE PAWN is the third one I’ve read in the past few months, and it’s my favorite so far.

Commander Peter Bentley, captain of the Australian destroyer Wind Rode, is the protagonist of this one, although all the usual members of the supporting cast, most notably First Lt. Robert Randall and bosun’s mate William “Hooky” Walker, are also on hand. Bentley and Wind Rode tend to get the dirty jobs, and their assignment this time is the trickiest so far. The ship is supposed to hide out among some islands extremely close to the Japanese mainland so they can spy on a new super-battleship that’s supposed to be launched soon. Whenever they observe that the battleship has put out to sea, they’re supposed to break radio silence, transmit the code word PAWN, and then get out of there as fast as they can.

Naturally, things do not go as planned.

In fact, between Japanese submarines, natives who may or may not be hostile on one of the islands Wind Rode uses for concealment, and a terrible storm at sea, Bentley has his hands full just keeping the ship going and getting where he’s supposed to be. And then, Bentley and his crew find the biggest surprise of all waiting for them.

I don’t know what it is about Macdonnell’s prose. There’s nothing the least bit fancy about it. The writing just goes about its business in workmanlike fashion, but before you know it, you’ve read half the book. He really had the storyteller’s knack. Then you get to the last chapter of this one and it’s not only incredibly suspenseful, there are two stand-up-and-cheer moments.

I found THE PAWN to be hugely enjoyable, and if you enjoy war and/or naval adventure fiction, I give it a great big recommendation. You don’t have to have read any of the others in the series to know what’s going on. Even after only three books, I feel like these characters are old friends already. Published originally in paperback in Australia by Horwitz Publications, it’s available these days in an e-book edition from Piccadilly Publishing.