2 / 5 Stars
'Bad Day at Black Rock' started life as a short story, titled 'Bad Time at Honda,' in The American Magazine in 1948. This Gold Medal Books paperback (No. 45, 143 pp.) was issued in December 1954, and was an expansion of the short story into a novel designed to tie-in with the 1955 film of the same name.
'Michael Niall' was the pseudonym of writer Howard Breslin (1912 - 1964) who published a number of novels during the 1940s and 1950s.
The eponymous hamlet is located in the California desert, and rarely does the Streamliner passenger train make a stop. So, it's a source of considerable stir when one day in the summer of 1945 the train stops, and a passenger gets off: a man named John Macreedy.
Macreedy's evaluation of Black Rock indicates he's here on a work trip, not for tourism:
A town like a thousand others, he thought, in this part of the country. Dust-plagued and shabby, with every flaw harshly revealed by the pitiless sun. Not attractive, but he'd seen worse, been pinned down in worse.
Save for a few exceptions, such as the veterinarian Doc Velie, and the young and attractive Liz Wirth, who operates the town garage, the townspeople of Black Rock are hostile towards Macreedy. Even before Macreedy reveals why he's come to town, Reno Smith, the local land baron who controls Black Rock, gives the command that the stranger is to be harassed and intimidated into leaving. But Macreedy, a veteran of World War Two, is not a man who scares easily. And when it comes to physical violence, he can handle his own......
The literary motif of the stranger who goes poking into the bad side of a bad town, has since become a mainstay of suspense and thriller fiction. Unfortunately, 'Bad Day' has all the strains of a novel constructed from the expansion of a short story: overly sedate pacing, padding in the form of regular conversations and interior monologues, and a denouement that goes on just a little too long. Well before the halfway point of the novel I was getting impatient with the way the narrative was dragging. The novel's ending didn't seem all that rewarding in terms of the effort I had to put in to get there.
The verdict ? 'Bad Day at Black Rock' is a Two-Star title. Those with a high level of patience may find it a rewarding read, but if the sharper, more fast-paced noir novels of the postwar era are your preference, then you'll want to examine other titles in the Gold Medal Book catalogue.
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