Dorothy B Hughes: 13 books

“It was surprising what old experiences remembered could do to a presumably educated, civilized man.” And Hugh Denismore, a young doctor driving his mother’s Cadillac from Los Angeles to Phoenix, is eminently educated and civilized. He is privileged, would seem to have the world at his feet,...

A starlet on a transcontinental train fears her director may be trying to kill her in this novel by Mystery Writers of America Grand Master Dorothy B. Hughes. Four years after she arrived in Los Angeles, Kitten Agnew has become a star. Though beautiful and talented, she’d be nowhere without...

A classic California noir with a feminist twist, this prescient 1947 novel exposed misogyny in post-World War II American society, making it far ahead of its time. Los Angeles in the late 1940s is a city of promise and prosperity, but not for former fighter pilot Dix Steele.  To his mind nothing...

A “delightful . . . nonstop action” thriller from the author of In a Lonely Place—“readers new to this forgotten classic are in for a treat” (Publishers Weekly). At the age of twenty-four, Griselda Satterlee has already lived two lifetimes. A star of the silver screen, she gives up...

On their second honeymoon, a woman’s husband is arrested for murder Griselda Satterlee is beginning to regret her second marriage to Con. Their  honeymoon was supposed to be joyous, romantic, and full of glamor—all of the things their first marriage wasn’t—but instead they are spending...

Lost in New York, a GI stumbles upon a nest of peculiar Germans Private First Class Johnnie Brown has only two days to spend in New York before he ships out to fight the Nazis. While his fellow soldiers amuse themselves at the Statue of Liberty, the Empire State Building, and the night clubs...

Handed a mysterious package, a woman finds herself caught in a deadly game Her name is not Eliza Williams. A fashionable young woman with a taste for adventurous men, she made the mistake of falling in love with Towner Clay—a New York City playboy whose international jetsetting conceals dangerous...

In El Paso, a ranch hand falls for a dangerous gringa Jose Aragon looks like a cowboy and, to his disgust, smells like one too. In El Paso between jobs, he’s standing outside the Chenoweth Hotel, praying for a room, a shower, and a couple of ice cold beers. Instead, he finds a woman: a sandy-haired,...

During the annual Fiesta, three desperate men converge in a perilous New Mexico town in this “extraordinary” crime novel (The New Yorker). It takes four days for Sailor to travel to New Mexico by bus. He arrives broke, sweaty, and ready to get what’s his. It’s the annual Fiesta, and...

Alone in New York City, a young actress becomes entangled in an international caper Lizanne Steffasson used to dream of life on the Broadway stage—that is, until she came crashing down to Earth. Having decided to aim lower, she dreams simply of being able to pay her rent—which is why she...

An escapee from a Spanish prison hunts for his best friend’s killer in New York For more than a year, Kit McKittrick languishes in a Fascist prison, his days spent in darkness and his nights tortured by fear of his limping jailer, whose name he never learns. He escapes Spain with the help...

To stop a Communist plot, a secretive man searches Los Angeles for a confidential report When bad weather forces his flight to Los Angeles to land outside of town, Steve Wintress agrees to share a car with three of his fellow travelers: a timid young soldier, a powerful Justice Department official,...

To prevent another war, a diplomat hides from enemies of peace Twelve years after the Second World War ended, America’s war efforts have been replaced by those of the Peace Department, whose chief responsibility is to oversee the police force that governs Germany. On the eve of the biennial...