The Moon in the Gutter: A Library of America eBook Classic

by David Goodis

For the first time, the best work of a distinctive master of American noir is available in authoritative e-book editions from The Library of America. The Moon in the Gutter (1953) is one of David Goodis’s many tours of the down-and-out neighborhoods of his native city of Philadelphia. William Kerrigan’s pursuit of the riddle of his sister’s death in an obscure alleyway provides the starting point for a tortuous journey into “the darkness of all lost dreams.”  Other David Goodis novels available as Library of America E-Book Classics  Nightfall, Dark Passage, The Burglar, and Street of No Return.

Genres: Noir, Crime, Fiction, Mystery, Novels, Pulp, Thriller

194 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 1953

About the author

Born and bred in Philadelphia, David Goodis was an American noir fiction writer. He grew up in a liberal, Jewish household in which his early literary ambitions were encouraged. After a short and inconclusive spell at Indiana University, he returned to Philadelphia to take a degree in journalism, graduating in 1937.

Reviews

[robin friedman · Rating 5 out of 5]

A Visit To Vernon Street

David Goodis ( 1917 -- 1967) lived and worked in Hollywood before returning to his hometown of Philadelphia in 1950. When he returned, he lived in a room in his parents' home and published pulp novels as inexpensive paperback originals. Among these novels is "The Moon in the Gutter" written in 1953 and set in a poor decaying section of Philadelphia. The book is included in a collection of five Goodis novels recently published by the Library of America: "David Goodis: Five Noir Novels of the 1940s and 50s". Each of the five books deserves individual attention. In 1983, Goodis' novel was loosely adapted for a French film, directed by Jean-Jacques Beineix and shown at the Cannes Film Festival. The film changes the setting from Philadelphia to Marseille.

Goodis wrote in a genre which tends to become formulaic, but each of his novels that I have read has its own character. This evocatively titled novel is about lonely and lost people-- categories which, the book suggests, are found widely across social classes. The book reminded me of the Victorian novelist George Gissing, particularly of his early book "The Nether World". Gissing wrote of the London poor and of their relationship to the more economically fortunate classes. Goodis explores similar themes in "The Moon in the Gutter" with a pessimistic sensitivity similar to Gissing's Among other writers with related tone and themes, I thought of Charles Bukowski and of Jack Kerouac.

The main character of the book is William Kerrigan,35, who lives unmarried in a squalid home on Vernon street with relatives. Kerrigan works as a stevedore in the tough world of the Philadelphia wharfs and is the only member of his household with a steady job. Seven months before the book begins, Kerrigan's beloved sister, Catherine, had killed herself in an alley due to depression resulting from rape. Kerrigan wants to find the perpetrator. Plot is less important in this book than character, place, and mood.

The settings of the book include the alley and the streets of the neighborhood, Kerrigan's home, the wharf where he works, and a shabby neighborhood bar called Dugan's Den. A character from a wealthier portion of the city, Channing, is a patron and a slummer at Dugan's Den. Early in the novel when he meets Kerrigan, Channing describes himself in terms that essentially apply to the other figures in the book. "I'm lonesome all the time.... I've been everywhere. I've done everything, and I've known everybody. And what it amounts to, I'm lonesome."

As he leaves Dugan's Den, Kerrigan reflects that "he was riding though life on a fourth-class ticket" before offering one of the many passages of description of the neighborhood in the book:

"He stared at the splintered front doors and unwashed windows and the endless obscene phrases inscribed with chalk on the tenement walls. For a moment he stopped and looked at the ageless two-word phrase, printed in yellow chalk by some nameless expert who put it there in precise Gothic lettering. It was Vernon Street's favorite message to the world. And now, in Gothic print, its harsh and ugly meaning was tempered with a strange solemnity."

As the book progresses, it shows violent scenes on the docks, in the streets, and in the homes. Besides Kerrigan's search for the man who ruined his sister, the plot turns on Kerrigan's relationship with Loretta Channing, the sister of the man that slums in Dugan's Den. Loneliness and isolation have no class boundaries in this novel. The tone of the book is of loss and poignant sadness.

"The Moon in the Gutter" offers a bleak yet lyrical vision of poverty and of what Goodis sees as the loneliness of the human condition. It is a work of literature that gets beyond the categories of pulp or noir.

Robin Friedman

[Φώτης Καραμπεσίνης · Rating 5 out of 5]

Αυτό που χαρακτηρίζει τους κορυφαίους στυλίστες του Noir είναι ένα λιτό, αφαιρετικό στυλ γραφής, εύληπτο και ταυτόχρονα ευεπίφορο σε συμβολισμούς. Οι κορυφαίοι του είδους, όπως είναι ο Goodis, χρησιμοποιούν τη φόρμα του "Μαύρου" ως όχημα, προκειμένου να βυθιστούν στον ανθρώπινο ψυχισμό, με μια δύναμη και πρωτοτυπία που ενίοτε παραπέμπει στο αρχαίο ελληνικό θέατρο.
Ο τίτλος του μυθιστορήματος μόνο τυχαίος δεν είναι. Το φεγγάρι που ανατέλλει δεν έχει τίποτα το ποιητικό, καθώς το φως του καθρεφτίζεται στα απόνερα του υπονόμου και σε κηλίδες αίματος σε απόμερα σοκάκια. Στην πορεία του παρακολουθεί ψυχρά και αδιάφορα τη ζωή των ταπεινών και καταφρονημένων υπάρξεων που σέρνονται στον βούρκο της καθημερινότητάς τους, κυνηγώντας την επιβίωση, και ονειρευόμενοι -σπάνια- τη ζωή. Ο δρόμος όπου η "παράσταση" της ζωής τους λαμβάνει χώρα είναι και η φυλακή τους, ένα θεατρικό σκηνικό όπου λείπουν τα -αχρείαστα πλέον- κάγκελα, γιατί απλά οι άνθρωποι της Vernon Street έχουν πλέον ιδρυματοποιηθεί και είναι ανίκανοι να ξεφύγουν από τον εαυτό τους.
Ο ήρωας του βιβλίου το επιχειρεί παρ' όλα αυτά και η αφορμή είναι -τι άλλο;- μια γυναίκα, ο έρωτας, ως η μόνη λύτρωση από όλα όσα τον κρατάνε δέσμιο του παρελθόντος του: ο τραγικός θάνατος της αδελφής του και οι απρόσωπες, αποκτηνωμένες σχέσεις με τα άτομα του ταπεινού εργατικού περιβάλλοντός του. Στιγμιαία έστω έρχεται σε επαφή ένα έναν άλλο κόσμο, όπου βασιλεύει η ομορφιά, τα αισθήματα, μια ζωή απαλλαγμένη από τη βία, την ένδεια του πνεύματος και της ματαιότητας.
Υπάρχει μια τραγικότητα στις σελίδες αυτές, καθώς ο ήρωας επιχειρεί να αναδυθεί από την περιρρέουσα λάσπη, από την προκαθορισμένη για τους ανθρώπους τής τάξης του μοίρα, με "όπλα" τη σωματική του ρώμη, το πείσμα και το ανυπότακτο πνεύμα - ένα "Non Serviam" ακαθόριστο, ασυνείδητο χωρίς στόχευση, το οποίο όμως τον φέρνει για μια στιγμή κοντά στο όνειρο και στην υπόσχεση της ευτυχίας.
Και το εισιτήριο για την ουτοπία του έχει μόλις 15 σεντς – το αντίτιμο του λεωφορείου που οδηγεί στις επάνω γειτονιές, μακριά από τις τρώγλες-, αν και όλοι γνωρίζουμε πως τα αόρατα δεσμά, η κόλαση των άλλων, είναι πολύ ισχυρά. "Δεν έχει πλοίο για σε, δεν έχει οδό" είναι αυτό που με κάθε τρόπο τού επαναλαμβάνουν οι λοιποί ομοιοπαθούντες έγκλειστοι στη "φυλακή" της Vernon Street. Και για μια ακόμα φορά, η ψευδαίσθηση της Ελευθερίας, θα υποταχθεί στην αδήριτη εξουσία της Αναγκαιότητας.

[Tim Orfanos · Rating 4 out of 5]

Το πιο ψυχογραφικό, πεσσιμιστικό και νεο-ρεαλιστικό 'νουάρ' του David Goodis, ο οποίος εντυπωσιάζει με τη διεισδυτικό του πένα. Η ατμόσφαιρα του βιβλίου είναι στοιχειωτική και καταδιωκτική εγκλωβίζοντας τους ήρωες, όπως τα έντομα στον ιστό της η αράχνη. Η ομώνυμη ταινία (1983) του Ζαν-Ζακ Μπενέξ με τη Ναστάζια Κίνσκι και τον Ζεράρ Ντεπαρντιέ βασίστηκε στο συγκεκριμένο βιβλίο, ενώ υποπτεύομαι ότι οι αναγνώστες/στριες δεν θα θέλουν να το αφήσουν από τα χέρια τους.

Όπως πολλοί εύστοχα αναφέρεται στο οπισθόφυλλο του βιβλίου, είναι από τα λίγα μυθιστορήματα όπου οι χαρακτήρες των ηρώων και η ατμόσφαιρα δημιουργείται μέσα από την έντονη δράση, γιατί (συμπληρώνω εγώ) η δράση πραγματοποιείται στον παρόν, δίνοντας τη αίσθηση ότι τα γεγονότα λαμβάνουν χώρα σε πρώτο χρόνο, και όχι μέσα από την αφήγηση με αναδρομές στο παρελθόν (flashbacks) - μέσω λοιπόν της δράσης οι αναγνώστες/στριες γνωρίζουν την προσωπικότητα και τα κίνητρα των ηρώων, και όχι το ανάποδο.

Ένα άλλο στοιχείο του συγκεκριμένου 'νουάρ' μυθιστορήματος, το οποίο τού δίνει την αξία του 'κλασικού', είναι η διαπίστωση ότι ο κεντρικός άξονας της πλοκής δεν είναι αστυνομικής υφής, όπως σε παρόμοιου είδους βιβλία, αλλά είναι η αγωνία αν οι 2 αντίθετοι κόσμοι που εκπροσωπεί το πρωταγωνιστικό ζευγάρι θα συγκρουστούν με αρνητικές συνέπειες ή θα υπάρξει μια μορφή σύνθεσης των 2 κόσμων. Οι 2 κόσμοι που αναφέρω είναι ο παρακμιακός μεταπολεμικός 'κόσμος' του λιμανιού στο πρόσωπο του Ουίλλιαμ, και ο κόσμος των προνομίων, της δημιουργικότητας και της φαινομενικής ισορροπίας στο πρόσωπο της φωτογράφου Λορέτα.

Εδώ, ο Goodis βρίσκεται σε έντονα λογοτεχνικό οίστρο σε αντίθεση με άλλα μυθιστορήματά του, ενώ το σημαντικότερο είναι ότι η ιστορία του συγκεκριμένου μυθιστορήματος δεν έχει σεναριακή δομή, όπως π.χ. το 'Σκοτεινό πέρασμα' που περιείχε διαλόγους με αρκετή συχνότητα θυμίζοντας τον τρόπο που γράφονται οι ατάκες των ρόλων του κάθε ηθοποιού. Ίσως, το μοναδικό αρνητικό στοιχείο θα μπορούσε να ήταν η έλλειψη έντονης πλοκής μυστηρίου, οπότε, στο σημείο αυτό, οφείλω να αναφέρω ότι υπάρχουν ψήγματα μόνο αστυνομικού θρίλερ, κυρίως, στην αρχή και στο τέλος του βιβλίου, ωστόσο, η υπαρξιακή αναζήτηση των ηρώων καταφέρνει να 'υφάνει' μια ατμόσφαιρα άκρως μυστηριακή, εμμονική και, παραδόξως, όχι έντονα απαισιόδοξη.

Υ.Γ.: H πόλη που εκτυλίσσονται τα γεγονότα στο βιβλίο είναι η Φιλαδέλφεια, ενώ στη ταινία τα γεγονότα της ιστορίας 'μεταφέρονται' στη Μασσαλία.

Βαθμολογία: 4,4/5 ή 8,8/10.

[Annetius · Rating 4 out of 5]

Το φεγγάρι είναι στον υπόνομο, το πεπόνι στην άμμο, τα μυαλά στα κάγκελα, η αλήθεια στους Sex Pistols κ.ο.κ. Αυτά είναι τα μεγάλα αξιώματα της ζωής, signed, sealed, delivered!
Δεν έπαιρνα ποτέ αστυνομικά μυθιστορήματα στις παραλίες, αλλά και γενικώς, δε μου το σφύριξε κανείς ότι ταιριάζουν με το παιδάκι που παίζει δίπλα με την άμμο, με τον κάγκουρα που βάζει τραπίδια παραδίπλα, με τον φουσκωτό κύκνο σε μεγέθυνση που τον παίρνει ο αέρας και τον κυνηγάνε σαν χαζοί πέντε μαντραχαλάδες, με τα stand-up paddles το νέο απαραίτητο furniture που καταλαμβάνει πλέον αρκετά τετραγωνικά μέτρα της ελληνικής ακτογραμμής. Ε λοιπόν, ταιριάζουν. [Όλα αυτά βέβαια είναι μόνο σάλτσες για τη γλαφυρότητα της αφήγησης. Αποφεύγω όσο γίνεται τις πληγείσες από αυτά παραλίες.]

Ο Goodis δίνει ένα πολύ αλητίριο αστυνομικό μυθιστόρημα, χωρίς αστυνόμους αλλά με την κατάλληλη πλέμπα να πρωταγωνιστεί, με μυστηριώδη όσο πρέπει υπόθεση ώστε να σου κράτα την περιέργεια σε εγρήγορση και αφήνοντας στον αναγνώστη μια φοβερή στο τέλος επίγευση των αμερικανικών πολιτειών, όπου οι απόβλητοι ζουν και διάγουν τον ζοφερό βίο τους στα περιθώρια της κοινωνίας, εκεί όπου το φεγγάρι καθρεφτίζεται στους βρομερούς υπονόμ��υς και στους υγρούς από αίμα και αλκοόλ αφώτιστους δρόμους.

[Eddie Watkins · Rating 4 out of 5]

A brooding meditation on dark things populated by barely developed characters mired in a claustrophobia most can't even acknowledge let alone wrest themselves from. But it wouldn't be a story if at least one of these characters caught a whiff of something else, some other realm of living that wasn't rotten with squalor, mildewed plaster, scummy bilge, and incestual urges. And this someone would be the main character of this nearly static tale, a William Kerrigan who is obsessed with his sister's death by rusty blade in a rat infested alley. His tale is saturated with ambiguity and bourbon-blur in a woozy world of degenerate humpbacks, slumming lushes, withered hags drunkenly parading their shrivelled gams, and shacks and rundown houses reverberating with domestic venom, their crowded interiors swollen with emotional starvation and long buried dreams. In other words it's just another hot Philadelphia summer. Just kidding...

Goodis is not the best writer at the technical level, as he relies far too much on cliches and hackneyed phrasing, but somewhere in his hackiness I see someone who had the ability to write a sophisticated and polished prose, but who, because of the exigencies of his situation, had to crank out one psycho-pulp noir after another. Or maybe he had faith that his obsessiveness was enough to carry the day, which it was/is...

Goodis' plot lines rarely emerge into the light of day. By this I mean that not only do they masochistically revel in dark bars and dark alleys poisoned by fading shimmers of moonlight that only make his characters' dark lives darker because of the feeble dreams of far faded goodness they lunarly inspire; but also because of the crowded interior nature of his narratives, the self-consuming introspection of his guilt-ridden everymen that rarely allows them a glimpse of an outer world untainted by their malignant outlook.

There is a movie out there based on this book, which was universally panned, but now I'm curious because many of the criticisms I've read of it - the static brooding, the atmosphere for the sake of atmosphere, the ambiguous resolution - are all qualities of the book itself.

[Carla Remy · Rating 4 out of 5]

A sad, grim, and intense book about life in the slums. It was good, but not fun.

[Toby · Rating 2 out of 5]

Kerrigan is kind of annoying and Goodis is deliberately vague in his storytelling, preferring to attempt capturing the sense of place and the worn out lives of the inhabitants of Vernon street, but I couldn't help but feel it was just an incomplete struggle to paint a less wholesome and charming view of a Steinbeck novella. Interestingly the Jean-Jacques Beineix adaptation starring Depardieu and Kinski is a much more affecting work, possibly thanks to the almost magical realist nature of the visuals underpinning the story.

[George K. · Rating 4 out of 5]

Δεύτερο βιβλίο του Ντέιβιντ Γκούντις που διαβάζω, μετά το πολύ καλό "Σκοτεινό πέρασμα" που διάβασα τον Σεπτέμβριο του 2014. Πρόκειται για ένα αρκετά πεσιμιστικό και κατά κάποιο τρόπο κλειστοφοβικό νουάρ, αφόρητα ρεαλιστικό και σκοτεινό, που δεν βασίζεται τόσο στην πλοκή του (που είναι καλή αλλά αρκετά απλή), όσο στους χαρακτήρες, τα περιορισμένα σε λίγα τετραγωνικά σκηνικά, και φυσικά στην ατμόσφαιρα. Η όλη πλοκή δεν είναι και τόσο αστυνομικής υφής, δεν έχει κάποιο ιδιαίτερο μυστήριο (αν και ο πρωταγωνιστής θέλει να μάθει ποιος άτιμος μπάσταρδος οδήγησε τη μικρή του αδελφή στην αυτοκτονία), είναι περισσότερο κοινωνικό δράμα όπου δυο διαφορετικοί κόσμοι έρχονται σε επαφή (ή και σε σύγκρουση), με την ατμόσφαιρα βέβαια σαφώς να είναι νουάρ. Προσωπικά μου άρεσε πολύ το βιβλίο αυτό, το βρήκα του γούστου μου, και βέβαια μου άρεσε πολύ ο τρόπος γραφής του Γκούντις, που είναι ρεαλιστικός και ωμός, πάντως σίγουρα σαν ιστορία δεν είναι για όλους. Είναι κρίμα που δεν έχουν μεταφραστεί άλλα βιβλία του συγκεκριμένου συγγραφέα (και ειδικά το "Shoot the Piano Player"), έχει γράψει κάμποσα ωραία νουάρ μυθιστορήματα και σαν όνομα είναι από τα πολύ καλά του είδους, αλλά πάλι καλά που έχουν μεταφραστεί έστω αυτά τα δυο. Αν το φέρει η τύχη, ίσως στο μέλλον διαβάσω και κάποιο άλλο βιβλίο του στα αγγλικά: Αν μη τι άλλο με ενδιαφέρει σαν συγγραφέας.

[Josh · Rating 2 out of 5]

"In the sticky darkness of a July midnight the cat waited there for more than a half hour. As it walked away, it lefts its paw prints in the dried blood of a girl who had died here in the alley some seven months ago."

Will Kerrigan is devoid of purpose following the death of his sister. He meanders through life working at the docks and obsessing over his lost family despite the fact he still has family members alive and well. An alleyway taunts him into action, the place of his sisters last breath draws his in and sets out a series of events which lead Will to discover the truth behind Catherine's demise.

An integral piece of this fragmented puzzle is a murder/suicide mystery compounded by the visual of dried blood in an alley and ghost of a memory. In Will’s sister Catherine, Goodis alludes to a ‘lady of the night’ profession without providing full disclosure. While tainting the deceased it also casts doubt on the pedestal Will so fondly sits Catherine atop. Her death constantly clouds his thoughts and impacts his judgment, even going so far as to point the finger at his own brother. This semi PI persona is made all the more attractive by hazy facts in light of Catherine’s death and Will’s questionable state of mind.

The sense of desired menace and unaccountable, unruly inhabitants of Vernon Street were delivered without conviction. Sure it’s a seedy place to live yet I think Goodis missed the target in conveying that true sense of dread after dark. Nick and Mooney are a couple of characters introduced early on who serve more as comic amusement than a testament to the terrors of Vernon. Personally I would've liked to have seen more of Ruttman, the infamous muscle of a man whose name is legend amongst the workers at the dock.

The main female lead in Loretta’s part felt misplaced. Along with her brother Newton slumming it on Vernon Street for kicks did little more than add another body to count against Catherine’s death. Loretta’s contribution didn’t account to much apart from adding an element of sass without substance while romanticising Will. For Newton, a frequent drinker, the bar (Dugan's Den) he’s most often cited provided the loud and boozy hovel needed in this kind of book. The bones of a deep and distinctly dark noir are there, yet the meat was nowhere to be found - shame really as Goodis is a master of noir, this just wasn't his best effort in my opinion. 2 stars.

This review is from 'The Moon In The Gutter' which appears in David Goodis: Five Noir Novels of the 1940s and 50s: http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/12...

[Bill · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really more like 3.5 stars, but Goodis is such a good writer I had to round up. This is a somewhat odd story in that the protagonist seems to warrant our sympathy when we first meet him, but quickly shows us his darker side and his inability to relate to women. And since this is a Goodis novel, there is no happy ending.

[Dave · Rating 5 out of 5]

Riding through life on a fourth class ticket, he called it. It was a rough neighborhood, not safe for man or woman. It was full of rundown tenements and people trying to forget themselves, forget their miserable lives. Kerrigan's teenage sister had slashed her throat in the alley following a brutal rape and beating. His brother subsisted on candy bars and whatever booze he could get his hands on. It was a hot summer and Dugan's was a good place to cool off. The men there passed the time with nothing better to do. This is a story about life in the hard slums of Vernon Street by the docks. Not a place for the weak or timid souls. It's a story of the pain that Kerrigan lives with as he goes night after night to the bloodstained alley where his angelic sister left this earth. It's the story about a pair of uptown siblings who try slumming it because there is something raw and honest there. It's a story about love and passion and the fact that there's no escape ever. Goodis was the poet of Philadelphia's mean streets and everything he wrote was pretty much a masterpiece.

[Andy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Nightmarish noir about a stevedore who may or may not have killed his prostitute sister. Only his grimy brother knows for sure and isn't telling.
The obscurity of his crime sends him to a waterfront dive where he drinks endlessly with a slumming rich kid. His beautiful sister toys with the stevedore's affections, and he romances her, eventually marrying her in a drunken stupor.
"Moon In The Gutter" has bizarre familial themes running through it: bizarre brother-sister relations and family death with very slim class distinctions. The leisure class and the working class hang out only to discover they both need to drink it off.

[Ed · Rating 4 out of 5]

I found this Goodis novel somewhat of a let-down from his other noirs I've read such as STREET OF NO RETURN, THE BURGLAR, or NIGHTFALL. There's a sharp class distinction drawn (rich v. poor) with a some romance and a murder mystery thrown in, as well. I believe he uses his customary Philadelphia setting, though, I didn't see as many landmarks to orient me. I liked the gritty stevedore and river dock scenes though the taproom scenes were less interesting to me. The almost casual beating on the female characters puzzled me. Overall, I liked the read, and I'll hunt up more of his fiction. I'll probably re-read DARK PASSAGES.

[tortoise dreams · Rating 4 out of 5]

Goodis returns to the Philly slums, and here presents the (all too rarely seen) working poor and their despairing, fingernail-hold onto some semblance of self-respect. A longshoreman obsessed with discovering who assaulted his sister and drove her to suicide. He's misplaced, suspended momentarily between two worlds, directionless. A wealthy man who frequents the cheapest dock-side bars. His beautiful slumming sister. The accurately described denizens of neighborhoods fixed somewhere between barely hanging on and outright squalor. The many shadowy forms shaping lives of quiet desperation. And though it may be hard to discern, an ending with one more scintilla of hope (in its own way) than the typical Goodis novel. Also a 1983 French film with Nastassja Kinski.

[Adam McPhee · Rating 4 out of 5]

You remember Gus from Mission Hill? Read this pulp novel about a stevedore trying to solve the death of his sister in his voice and you'll love every page of it.

[Charles Dee Mitchell · Rating 4 out of 5]

Dave Goodis wrote the bleakest American noir novels. No wonder his reputation was always higher in France than it was in the States. (Insert Jerry Lewis joke here.)

William Kerrigan is a Philadelphia dockworker obsessed with the rape and murder of his little sister in an alley in the rundown neighborhood a few blocks from his family home. Kerrigan’s world is defined by alcohol and a hand-to-mouth existence. He is convinced that he can find his sister’s murderer among the people he knows.

You are going to either love or hate the ending.

[Jeff Miller · Rating 4 out of 5]

I've been meaning to read Goodis for a while, although cannot remember where I came across him. Perhaps in a Serpent's Tail newsletter and certainly he fits comfortably in their canon of publications. Like fellow Tail author Derek Raymond, Goodis may not be a household name, but I'm sure that you'll know who has actually read his work by that look in the eye, the same one you get when you mention Raymond; these are not books for everyone. This is a portrayal of hard living in Philadelphia, they even refer to themselves as fourth world. Life is brutal (the fight scenes in here are plentiful and painfully written) but there is an understanding from the characters as to why, and it is how they deal with that understanding that elevates this far above pulp writing. Often compared with Raymond Chandler I would argue this is better; Chandler has dated, this hasn't.
If you like Raymond, or Chandler for that matter, you'll like Goodis. I was also reminded of Selby Jr, not in style, but in his understanding of the people he is writing about here.
It's hard, it's brutal, it's not going to leave you with a spring in your step...but it's well worth taking a trip down Vernon Street.

[Tim Schneider · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm still cogitating on this so maybe eventually I'll decide I like it more. But probably not. Kerrigan is a stevedore who works the docks and lives in the slums of Vernon Street. His sister killed herself a year following a rape and Kerrigan can't get over it. It all seems like a set-up for a classic noir. And Goodis is capable of giving us that. But he doesn't. Kerrigan even gets mixed up with an uptown girl whose brother (and her for that matter) make a habit of slumming in a dive bar on Vernon Street. The bar is populated by the disaffected, but rather than making anything much of them, they're largely caricatures. This really all atmosphere and no pay-off. If it has any real redeeming value it is definitely atmospheric. And it's a quick read. I busted it out in three evenings. I don't feel bad about reading it. But it really struggles to even reach the level of okay.

[Jim · Rating 4 out of 5]

David Goodis's The Moon in the Gutter comes close in its fashion to adhering to the Aristotelian unities. In the dockside slums of an unnamed city, Bill Kerrigan is introduced as he morosely stares at a bloodstain in the gutter, all that is left to remind him of his sister Catherine, who had committed suicide there almost a year before. Kerrigan meets a pretty blonde in the local bar, where she has come to pick up her drunken brother. She is drawn to him, but he can't shake loose from the lurid life he has been living as a longshoreman.

Jean-Jacques Beneix had filmed this book back in 1983, using the same title. It is a good read with a naturalistic feel.

[Eloy Garcia · Rating 5 out of 5]

Novel·la fantàstica. Una meravella.

[Pere Garcia · Rating 4 out of 5]

Amors impossibles, baixos fons, camins marcats per la condició social i el lloc de naixement... ningú pot escapar dels suburbis.

Això és "La lluna sobre l'asfalt" de Goodis.

I mola. Sobretot l'ambient, el paisatge i uns personatges perdedors que viuen la vida el millor que saben.

Potser el millor resum el fan a la contracoberta n'Àlex Martín i en Jordi Canal: personatges perduts, fatalisme, no hi ha esperança ni redempció pels habitants de Vernon Street. L'únic consol el troben al cul d'una botella.

[Mark · Rating 2 out of 5]

The way you approach this novel, and most of Goodis' work (though not all), depends on how you answer the eternal question: glass half full, glass half empty. Goodis was more likely to backhand the glass off the table, dashing its contents to a mud-caked, bloodstained floor. In his best work, Black Friday for me, he can convince you there's not much worth in life and the only reason we're here is to be punished, repeatedly. Even if you're unsure where you sit on the optimist/pessimist scale from one day to the next. And there's a certain power in that kind of writing.

In Moon in the Gutter, we're presented with a typical Goodis scenario. [Goodreads synopsis.] The problem is, I don't feel Goodis did enough to convince me of his pessimistic views this time. Oh, there are plenty of downtrodden scenarios, but the way he moves his players across the chessboard, his invariably pessimistic ending didn't feel true. And since one doesn't read Goodis for the happy ending, the amount of conviction he puts into the credo "Life Sucks" is a deal breaker. So, in typical loser fashion, Goodis was unable to rise to the challenge and is only slightly better off than his wasted characters.

[David · Rating 2 out of 5]

David Goodis is commonly ranked in the top tier of noir novelists, and The Moon in the Gutter is commonly ranked among his best work. One recent example: in The Rough Guide to Crime Fiction (2007), Barry Forshaw cites The Moon in the Gutter as his representative Goodis text in arguing that, of all the noir novelists, "Goodis comes the closest to the existential angst of Camus and Sartre." I wish I could see it, but I can't. The main thing I see in The Moon in the Gutter is bad writing. The lesser problem is that Goodis' prose is often painful to read--he strings together limp, cliché-ridden sentences as if he does not remember what his previous sentence was or have any idea what his next sentence will be. The greater problem is that his characters seem to behave as they do because they are in a noir novel and not for other discernible reasons. To Goodis' credit, he does take a valiant stab at noir profundity in the novel's last chapter, but the rest of the book is not there to back it up. In sum, a major disappointment.

[Kamakana · Rating 3 out of 5]

280511: second review: for me this is a lesser goodis. set in port slums our protagonist is a brute, tough, inarticulate, working-class stevedore, who gets involved and twisted by love for a rich girl, and the crime/detective plot serves only incidentally, however much he obsesses over the sister who was too good for their part of town.... i can see how it might appeal but despite some great poetic renderings of place, for me there is too much leaning on class as some explanatory theory...

note: the title recalls to me an Oscar Wilde quote: we are all of us in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars...

first review: also an 80s film by Jean Jacques Beneix with Gerard Depardieu...

[Bryan Clark · Rating 5 out of 5]

Whilst ostensibly a murder mystery this is fundamentally a poetic novel about the brutality of life at the margins of society and about despair. For me ultimately it is a novel about the futility of hope, it reminds me of a line from an old Tom Waits song: sing me a rainbow, steal me a dream.

[Blanca Noguera · Rating 5 out of 5]

No soc gens de llegir crim ni novel·la negra i aquest autor i aquesta història m'han atrapat per complet. Tan fosca, tan morbosa, amb tanta melanconia... Goodis era un homo molt i molt trist, però tenia una ment brillant.

[Trent · Rating 5 out of 5]

Just reread. Powerful and very moving. One of Goodis' best.

[The Cannibal · Rating 3 out of 5]

Vernon Street, rue sordide de Philadelphie, est un lieu qui pèse sur les épaules de ses habitants, un lieu qui vous aspire et vous retient dans ses filets.

Vous y habitez et jamais vous n'en sortirez, jamais vous ne vous élèverez dans votre condition, toute votre vie vous serez un looser, habitant dans un taudis, avec toute votre famille, buvant de l'alcool ou traficotant des certificats de mariage, ou, au mieux, vous serez docker et manipulerez des tonnes de fret dans votre putain de misérable vie.

Goodis a un certain talent pour nous brosser les portraits de loosers finis… Un talent certain, je dirais même, pour nous décrire aussi la misère crasse et les pauvres ères qui hantent ces rues sordides, ces épaves humaines imbibées d'alcool à tel point qu'on aurait peur d'allumer une cigarette à côté de certains.

Rien à dire, c'est un roman est noir de chez noir qui parle de conditions sociales et de la difficulté de s'en échapper, de se hisser au-dessus de sa condition, de ce quartier qui a façonné ses habitants, et pas le contraire.

Oui, ici, noir c'est noir et il ne reste même plus l'espoir. Entre Kerrigan qui cherche le violeur de sa soeur (soeur qui s'est suicidée ensuite) qui est coincé entre un frère alcoolo d'un niveau médaille d'or aux J.O, un père coureur de jupons (et de ce qu'il y a dessous), mais possédant un grand coeur, la nouvelle copine de son paternel, la fille de celle-ci qui lui court derrière…

Sans parler des femmes qui boivent, qui se font battre, qui frappent elles aussi, qui se prostituent et qui, à 30 ans, en paraissent 60.

Oui, c'est un roman super noir, sec comme un coup de trique, brûlant comme un alcool fort, et pourtant, je n'ai pas ressenti l'ivresse que j'attendais, même si le début m'avait collé une mandale et un début de gueule de bois.

Certes, l'histoire est presque secondaire, même si le final est assez sordide, mais j'ai eu l'impression de survoler la dernière partie alors que les premiers chapitres m'avaient happées violemment.

En fait, je suis "sortie" de ce roman au moment ou Kerrigan commence à répondre aux avances de Loretta et qu'il va la retrouver en endossant son costume du dimanche, qui, pour un habitant des beaux quartiers comme Loretta, équivaut sans doute à des loques pour torcher les pattes du chien après sa balade dans la boue…

Bref, j'avais commencé par me prendre des coups d'entrée de jeu avec les descriptions et les atmosphères bien sordides de Goodis et je me suis perdue sur la fin, dans les 40 dernières pages, avant de me reprendre un coup dans les gencives.

Dommage… Malgré tout, je suis contente d'avoir découvert cet auteur de Roman Noir car il l'art et la manière pour plonger son lecteur dans la sombritude (néologisme offert) humaine.

[Diana]

Well, that was anticlimactic!

Longshoreman Will Kerrigan is mourning his sister, who supposedly killed herself after being raped. Determined to find her attacker, he comes into contact with several disparate people over a 3-day period. Is one of them the guilty party?

If you like David Goodis, you'll recognize several of his usual tropes: the toxic family (held together either by blood or proximity) our protagonist can never free himself from -- and really doesn't want to try; the classic noir split between good girl and femme fatale; the seamy, dangerous urban underbelly settings; and the tone of fatalism that freezes even the relatively dynamic characters into passivity and impotence.

As usual, I appreciate the author's descriptions of space -- particularly his penchant for finding the gold in the dross. But, the domestic violence -- unusual for this author -- was off-putting as was the insistence that Catherine's worth was connected to her sexual purity. Finally, while I understood what the author was trying to do with the ending (see above for what I say about "fatalism") and that this is more a character study than an actual mystery, the way Will just abruptly dropped his trauma and obsession really bothered me.

Finally, while I always like Mr. Goodis' meditations on class, the reality is is that Loretta's family is just as damaged as anyone in Kerrigan's. If we were supposed to think that he would be happier with her because his physical needs would be taken care of, I didn't.

[Brett · Rating 3 out of 5]

So my sister and I are sort of hard-boiled/noir literature lunatics, and I remember her mentioning a while ago that this was one of her all time favorites. Maybe it's because of the high expectations, but I kinda left this one feeling unsatisfied. I love the characters and the world created, and I appreciate that there's actually very little crime her save a previous murder that hangs over the whole thing like a dark shroud, but I couldn't really appreciate the story's class divide thesis based on how things play out. The ending feels rushed, with only one really poignant and romantic idea to me. Maybe the weakest Goodis I've read yet? Coming off the heels of "The Burglar" which I had a hard time with at first, but ended up loving, this one don't seem to cut the mustard. Am I crazy?