Recommended reading – The Cocktail Waitress (2012).

The Cocktail Waitress (2012).

by James M. Cain.

Hard Case Crime.

Published posthumously.

Hardcover.

First edition.

ISBN-10: 1781160325

ISBN-13: 978-1781160329

Description:

Grieving widow … or black widow?

The day Joan Medford buried her husband was a fateful one – because before the day was out she’d meet the two men who would change her life forever. Forced to take a job waitressing yo support herself and her child, Joan finds herself caught between the handsome young schemer whose touch she comes to crave and the wealthy older man whose touch repels her … but who otherwise would make a tempting husband number two. It’s a classic Cain triangle – brutal sexual and stark – that can only end in death. But for whom, the guilty … or the innocent?

The final novel written by James M. Cain and never before published, The Cocktail Waitress is a testament to the enduring power of one of the most acclaimed novelists of the twentieth century. The author of unforgettable noir classics such as Double Indemnity, Mildred Pierce, and The Postman Always Rings Twice, Cain’s work remains as impossible to put down today as when first written, and will leave even jaded modern readers breathless. Featuring an afterword by Edgar and Shamus Award-winning editor Charles Ardai. One of the most celebrated and notorious crime writers of all time, James M. Cain launched his career with the publication of two back-to-back masterpieces – The Postman Always Rings Twice and Double Indemnity – selling millions of copies worldwide and inspiring classic movies. Cain continued with an unmatched run of noir novels including Mildred Pierce which inspired both the Academy Award-winning film starring Joan Crawford and the Emmy-winning HBO miniseries starring Kate Winslet. Cain died in 1977. And that’s where everyone thought the story ended. But James M. Cain had one more story to tell – one last blistering tale of sex and greed, betrayal and deception, written at the end of his life but never published – The Cocktail Waitress. Destined to take its place alongside his other classics, The Cocktail Waitress is Cain at his brutal and seductive best.

"Here, long after anyone would have expected it, is the voice of James M. Cain, as fresh and as relevant as ever. The Cocktail Waitress will involve you, and then shock you with an ending you'll never forget. A true rarity: a reader’s novel that’s also a literary event." – Stephen King.