I Should Have Stayed Home (Midnight Classics) [Paperback]

Horace McCoy (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 1, 1995 | Series: Midnight Classics

Mona and Ralph, two jobless roommates desperate to become stars, are introduced to Hollywood society after Mona curses a judge during a friend's trial. Ralph battles with his own corruption and loss of principle, as theft, prostitution and suicide wash them away.

Product Details

• Paperback: 113 pages
• Publisher: Serpent's Tail (March 1, 1995)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1852424028
• ISBN-13: 978-1852424022
• Product Dimensions: 7.8 x 5 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4.6 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #815,928 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

17 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars unsung composer of crime, April 29, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: I Should Have Stayed Home (Midnight Classics) (Paperback)

Horace McCoy is simply one of the finest stylists to have operated in the noir form. He was a conflicted fellow who felt he ought to be a variation on Fitzgerald but who was actually blessed with a fine talent for something very different from his hero. This conflict tortured him(and led to a couple of bland but very successful mainstream novels) but resulted in three of the great books of noir---I Should Have Stayed Home, They Shoot Horses, Don;'t They? and Kiss Tomorrow Goodbye. He was a true poet of the grim reality and horribly neglected .

8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Remarkably Contemporary, September 5, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: I Should Have Stayed Home (Midnight Classics) (Paperback)

I have no idea what "Simpleminded and Obvious" is talking about. This was a truly enjoyable book - I read it in one sitting, and didn't want it to end. The style is sharp, perceptive, and seemingly effortless. I also found the storyline remarkably contemporary.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars ... or the dark side of Hollywood..., March 21, 2002

By 

Jack Felson (Paris, France) - See all my reviews

This review is from: I Should Have Stayed Home (Midnight Classics) (Paperback)

After his huge editorial problems following the writing of his powerful "No Pockets in the Shroud", McCoy comes back to the Hollywood circle and builds a solid story starring a twin brother of Robert "They shoot Horses..." Syverten, Ralph Carston, a more muscled character - as McCoy himself was - but as naive as him, who came from his Southern home to become an actor - as McCoy himself did. He shares a small bungalow with a young pretty girl, Mona Matthews. This time they try to get in movies attending not marathon contests, but luxurious cocktails. But his accent doesn't give Ralph the opportunity to break in movies. He meets a rich old woman who falls in love with him but doesn't do anything for him to succeed as an actor. Naive and stubborn at the same time, he keeps wandering in Hollywood as Mona leaves the city after showing too much in the studios and wasting all of her chances to succeed.

McCoy's painting of Hollywood in the 30's is still valid. It's not as sober and successful as "They shoot Horses..." but it's still very realistic, contemporary and well-described, with a real dramatic intensity. It's a novel which reflects not only what McCoy saw in Hollywood (where he worked as a screenwriter from 1933 to the end of his life), but also his own disillusions: he came to Hollywood in 1931 to work as an actor and a screenwriter but failed as an actor, because of his accent.

Begun with "They shoot Horses, don't they?", McCoy's Hollywood "dilogy" ends with this short book where the writer invests himself mainly in Johnny Hill, an attractive, realistic character able (like Mike Dolan did in "No Pockets in a Shroud") to anticipate World War II.