A Hell of a Woman

By Jim Thompson

Frank "Dolly" Dillon has a job he hates, working sales and collections for Pay-E-Zee Stores, a wife named Joyce he can't stand, and an account balance that barely allows him to pay the bills each month. Working door-to-door one day, trying to eke money out of folk with even less of it than he has, Dolly crosses paths with a beautiful young woman named Mona Farrell. Mona's being forced by her aunt to do things she doesn't like, with men she doesn't know -- she wants out, any way she can get it. And to a man who wants nothing of what he has, Mona sure looks like something he actually does.

Soon Dolly and Mona find themselves involved in a scheme of robbery, murder and mayhem that makes Dolly's blood run cold. As Dolly's plans begin to unravel, his mind soon follows.

In A Hell of a Woman, Jim Thompson offers another arresting portrait of a deviant mind, in an ambitious crime novel that ranks among his best work.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0316403733
• ISBN13: 9780316403733
• Release Date: August 2014
• Publisher: Mulholland Books
• Length: 208 Pages
• Weight: 0.39 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 5.4" x 8.2"

Customer Reviews

a hard & fast suspense jewel

Jim Thompson & Larry Brown have at least one thing in common...happy endings and classic good guys are almost impossible to find in their books. In the hit or miss world of Jim Thompson novels this one certainly hits...hard! Hell Of A Woman is an ugly story that features characters with few, if any, redeeming qualities. This has surpassed The Killer Inside as my favorite Thompson novel. The suspense and surprise twists that books like The Alcoholics lack can be found here in spades. Thompson seems a little too at home in this setting of paranoia, sex & crime. Its one shortcoming is typical of Thompson stories...it does occasionally come unwravelled, though not often enough to matter. I honestly didn't know how this one was going to turn out. You have the general idea of what's going down, but you can never be sure who's going to fall and who's going to get away with it. Thompson is a master of this hard-boiled genre and this is surely a highlight in an up and down career. Curl up around an ashtray and enjoy!

Loved it! The book that made me a Jim Thompson fan!

I'd heard high-praise for Mr. Thompson's books--from Stephen King to James Ellroy--but it wasn't until I read A Hell of a Woman that I became a believer. It's not only dark, like you'd expect, but alive! The book gets inside your head and won't leave, even after you've finished the last page. Images you will never shake! Read it!

A Hell of a Woman is wicked, wicked, wicked.

This novel deserves to be known as one of Thompson's best. Dolly Dillon may not appear to be as menacing as Lou Ford, but he is, if possible, more insane. Population 1280, Savage Night, The Nothing Man, After Dark, My Sweet, and The Killer Inside Me all feature 1st-person narrators with mental problems, but none of them have a problem like Dillon. Read to the end to see what I mean.

One of the best noir crime novels I have ever read.

The story's narrator Dolly Dillon is so exquisitely creepy. A Hell of a Woman is the type of book that leaves you feeling a bit disturbed when you finish reading. A fabulous journey into the dark side of humanity. I can't wait to read another Jim Thompson novel.

Better than Cain

I think this is one of Thompson's best books. He may use the basic Cain formula, but he takes us a lot further inside the mind of his narrator; in fact, a little too far for comfort.