The Continental Op almost loses himself. That's the scary part of 'Red Harvest'. Amidst all the shootings and shambles of Personville (or Poisonville as everyone refers to it), he almost goes native. That's really rather scary. That's the power of 'Red Harvest'.
This was Hammett's first novel and is a fix-up, much like the following 'Dain Curse'. A fix-up is a selection of short stories that are hammered together, with a lot of necessary alterations and extra material, into a novel. They were fairly common in the transitional era from story magazines to novels as the primary source of fiction.
The Continental Op was an agency detective (think Pinkerton's) of unknown name who appeared as the protagonist in many of Hammett's stories, a hard-boiled detective with few scruples about doing what's necessary to find the truth and get the job done. That pragmatism almost defeats him when he accepts the task of cleaning up a whole corrupt town. How cam he possibly do that? Well, by setting the crooked cops and different groups of mobsters at each other's throats and then keeping stirring until they're all dead. It's the job from nightmares and he does it to spite his client, who began all the crookedness to begin with and is now trapped by it.
The narrative is clearly quite episodic, apart from the finale, and you can spot the seams between the component stories but the linking material really lifts the whole piece, especially the interlude where the Op fears for his own integrity and the chance that he may have caught the bloodlust that inhabits the crooked town. Hammett has such marvelous prose that the actual events are almost irrelevant, but here the stories do matter, and the relationships do build. There's one relationship in particular between the Op and an openly mercenary Dinah Brand which works, and the mystery over whether the Op killed her while under the influence is a rather dangerous one, especially after he confesses he fears for his integrity to her. The danger of the claustrophobic environment is clearly apparent, and when he beats out of town in the abrupt ending for fear of being arrested, it's clear that Personville isn't a place he'll be going to again soon, even if he is innocent of any legal crime.
This is really the way a crime story should be. Not at all romanticised, not removed from the violence but deep in it. There is no glamour and even success leaves a tarnish. Bizarrely, and I am a squeamish person, it is not at all a shocking story so much as engrossing. 'Red Harvest' is widely acclaimed and certainly builds further the foundations of noir, first set up by its shorter form forbears. Hammett could write, and that is why he is one of my favourite authors. The prose wins me over, as it does in so many of my other favourite novels, which I will touch on in the coming weeks and months.
If quality writing and prose is what appeals to you then read 'Red Harvest'. It's uncommonly good, even if you can see the seams between the source stories. As an added recommendation I even finished a whole collected edition of the short stories, and I hate reading shorter fiction.
O.
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