The Postman Always Rings Twice. By James M. Cain

The Postman Always Rings Twice

and

Double Indemnity

James M. Cain

Everyman's Library. First published 1934 and 1936.

These two stories appear in volume of collected stories by Cain. Of the 8 stories in the book, the above two are novelettes, of about 100 pages each. In addition there is a long novel of about 300 pages (to be dealt with in the next post) and then five short stories about 10 to 15 pages each. 

Both the above tales describe insurance related crime. In the first, a drifter gets a job at a lonely petrol filling station run by a husband and wife team. The drifter then teams up with the wife to kill the husband for his insurance money. But the crime goes wrong, involving him in further murders, until he is convicted and sentence to be hanged. The story is narrated by him in the first person as he waits for the sentence to be carried out.

The second story describes an insurance agent who visits a house to sell automobile insurance, and then is seduced by (or seduces) the wife, and then, together with her, hatches a plot to sell accident insurance to the husband and then stage an accident for him. Again the plot goes wrong, leading to all sorts of complications, and finally conviction and the death sentence.

Both stories are reminiscent, to me, of James Hadley Chase, books like 'The World in my Pocket' or 'No Orchids for Miss Blandish'. But Cain just about predates Chase, and according to Wikipedia, the latter was inspired by the former. Cain's stories are set in Southern California, in Los Angeles and its environs, during the great depression in America. I was steered to Cain by Internet articles on Chandler, and in general, the 'noir' detective fiction of Hammett, Chandler, et al. Unlike Chandler, Cain has a sparse, direct and only very slightly ironic writing style. He does not spend time describing the setting or building up character. All the same, the reader is very quickly able to build up a clear idea of the people. The stories however are straightforward, linear and simple, and to me at least, mostly predictable. Thus I was not impressed, and do not find any larger meaning in these two stories.