Showing results by author "Martin M. Goldsmith" in All Categories

Alexander Roth is a jazz fiddle player who can't quite seem to catch a break after losing his job and having his best girl Sue leave him to pursue her dream of becoming a famous actress in Hollywood. After failing to find any work in New York City, he decides to sell everything he's got and head out on the road to California in pursuit of Sue. Hundreds of miles later, Roth finds himself penniless and hungry on the side of the road, trying to thumb a ride in desperation. He thinks all his problems are solved when a generous and boisterous bookie named Haskell stops to pick him up and take him ...

1938. Alexander Roth is hitchhiking from New York to Los Angeles, hoping to reconnect with his self-absorbed, cutesy-poo girlfriend. A car stops to pick him up and he is soon plunged into a nightmare from which there may be no escape. This is a forgotten noir masterpiece that has languished for decades in the swamps of neglected crime fiction. Movie director Edgar G Ulmer cranked out the movie version in less than a month on a microscopic budget for one of the "poverty row" studios in Hollywood, and it is now widely recognized as one of the greatest in the film noir genre. The novel is its equal in every way.