In honour of Dashiell Hammett’s birthday on May 27, we’re highlighting his 1929 novel Red Harvest. This is the first of two novels featuring the Continental Op, a detective with the Continental Detective Agency in San Francisco (modelled on the Pinkerton National Detective Agency, where Hammett had worked about a decade before). The Continental Op, whose name is never revealed, has been sent to Personville to meet with Donald Willsson, the publisher of the main newspaper in town. However, this town is riddled with corruption, and Willsson is murdered while on his way to meet with the Op. The Op soon discovers, in his quest to solve the murder, that Personville’s nickname of Poisonville is well earned, and that digging up rocks to expose the creatures lurking below brings more death and destruction. You can read both Red Harvest and its sequel, The Dain Curse, here on Faded Page.

Hammett’s reputation as one of the founders of the hard-boiled genre of detective fiction is well earned. If you enjoy this kind of novel and want to see more of it on Faded Page, come join us and proofread a few pages. For more information about how to volunteer, check out our companion site, Distributed Proofreaders Canada.