Bøger af Elliott Chaze

One of the best crime novels of the 50's, and a sublime example of American Noir, is BLACK WINGS HAS MY ANGEL by Elliott Chaze, whose earlier war novel, THE STAINLESS STEEL KIMONO, was much admired by Ernest Hemmingway. Chaze took the standard dime store crime novel and turned it into an edgy piece of literature. His use of complex sentences, long descriptive passages, and characters who continue to surprise us throughout the narrative prove that the American crime novel was capable of greater depths. The story follows the turbulent love affair of a pair of uprooted misfits, an ex-hooker and an ex-con, who are brought together by a mutual love of money. Adrift between the cracks of society, they form a bond that is less like love and more like fate. Left on their own they would have led lives of criminal mischief, misdemeanor and petty crime, but together, embarking on a dark journey across the American landscape, they create absolute mayhem.

ONE IS A LONELY NUMBERThey cut out part of his tubercular lung in prison. But after the breakout, all Larry Camonille can do is run and keep on running. He's ready to die rather than go back inside. Mexico looks good, where the weather is more accommodating to a man with bad lungs. He wants to stay in Chicago and take care of that lying tramp who promised to keep the getaway money for him. But Chicago is too hot. On the lam, Camonille bums it down to Ohio. That's where he meets Vera, a used-up lush with a warm and inviting manner. And Jan, fresh and young and boy-crazy. They all want something from Camonille, but all he has to give is his life.BLACK WINGS HAS MY ANGEL When Ken first meets Virginia, he's fresh off a jail break and a gig on an oil rig. She’s his first woman after months on the water but how could he know she'd get under his skin so quickly? That instead of ditching her he'd come to need her, not only for himself but for the foolproof robbery scheme his cellmate had cooked up before he was shot to death going over the wire? Ken has a plan, and Virginia can handle a Packard like a pro--and she wants the bucks even more than he does. They stay together, they plan together, and before long they're on the run together. But can either one of them really love the other? Or trust the other? 

Narrated by a death-row killer, this noir classic recounts the ultimate heist, undertaken by an escaped convict and a cheap prostitute with a refined manner. "Flawless ... beyond perfection." - New York magazine.