Cashel gave me Chester Himes’ A Rage in Harlem for Christmas. I read it in one go in Memphis on a rainy afternoon. I had ducked into a club on Beale Street – as you do – for some lunch, a beer, and live music – because I had been walking for 3, 4 miles, and didn’t have an umbrella. I was hungry, my muscles ached, and I figured I’d wait out the rainfall. I’ve never read one of Himes’ books (and am so glad I have now: I will read more) and from the first page, the first scene, with the crazy counterfeiter and his exploding stove and all the chaos that ensues – I was hooked. I was so hooked everything else fell away. A languid trio played some blues, but they took frequent breaks. I’d put the book down and listen to the music, clap, be present for whatever the moment brought. Then I’d go back to the book. Nobody was hurrying me to give up the table. The place was practically empty. (I left a huge tip, of course.)
A Rage in Harlem is riveting and also hilarious. It never stops to take a breath and features a series of unforgettable characters and set-pieces – the shoot-out at the old warehouse by the river, the guy who dresses up as a nun and murmurs incomprehensible Bible verses to passersby, the telephone booths and bars, the funeral home, the rat-trap hotel rooms … The writing is superb: taut, tight, the language of a cynical flat-affect noir, with those comparisons and metaphors/similes without which you just don’t have a noir. And a bumbling desperate love-lorn credulous lead character, who is thrust into a cascading series of terrifying events, all as he tries to rustle up the cash to get the hell out of hock and to get his woman back – a woman he KNOWS is being faithful to him, he just KNOWS it.
Poor Jackson. When he woke up that morning (the book feels like it takes place in a 24-hour period), he had no idea he would end the day barreling through the streets of New York in a stolen hearse, unaware of the dead body in the back, having no idea where he’s going, just that he needs to get away – and FAST – plowing through a vegetable stand at one point, all while being chased by multiple groups of terrifying people, including his boss, whose hearse he stole. The NYPD is on the case as well, and keep getting reports of a hearse careening down Park Avenue, and is that the hearse you all are looking for? I mean, how many other runaway hearses are there at any given moment. You can’t really HIDE when you’re driving a runaway hearse. Even in New York City everybody is going to remember a random hearse plowing through a vegetable stand and then hanging a left.
I was laughing so hard. I loved it so much and I read it in the perfect setting.
The rain let up after a couple of hours and I walked home.
