This is pure delicious Thompson. He pulls you in with a protagonist to pity--Dillon who spares no chances to tell you how mean the world has been to him. Then he meets a sweet gal equally under life's thumb. Maybe he can save her...and himself at the same time. Quickly though you begin to figure his intentions ain't so pure and his luck not so much the result of a cruel world as it is the residue of his character. But you still humor the idea of redemption--the girl at least is worth saving. Thompson keeps pulling the thread--unravelling hope for this guy. And then the fall as if pushed out the back of a moving truck. The story slides across hard asphalt, Dillon is dumber, blinder and crueler than we feared, sliding off the road to a hard stop in the bushes. As he so often does, Thompson supplies a great ending. In this case two-- and you are then left wondering who the title actually refers to. ( )

WOW! ( )

¿Quién tiene la potestad de perdonar una vida o de dar muerte? En el caso de Dillon, un vendedor a domicilio de escasa moral, todas las dudas se disipan cuando conoce a la joven y frágil Mona, que durante años ha sido víctima de las maldades de su tía, una rica anciana que ha llegado a convertirla prácticamente en una prostituta. ¿No merece la muerte un ser tan despreciable, lascivo, corrupto y podrido? Sin duda alguna, aunque Dillon no haya llegado avalorar que cualquier acto acarrea consecuencias, y que la conciencia propia quizá tenga brechas ocultas que solo se descubren al ponerla a prueba.

At the beginning of the book, "dolly" (a man) and his wife Joyce are extremely unhappily married. The author writes a domestic violence scene:
" 'joyce,' I said. 'I said I was sorry, joyce. I'm asking you to please fix me some supper, joyce. Please, understand? Please!'
'Keep on asking,' she said. 'It's a pleasure to refuse.'
She went on making with the eyebrow pencil. You'd have thought I wasn't there.
'Baby,' I said, 'I'm telling you. I'm kidding you not. You better drag tail into that kitchen while it's still fastened on to you. You screw around with me a little more and you'll have to carry it in a satchel.'
'Now, aren't you sweet?' She said.
'I'm warning you, joyce. I'm giving you one last chance.'
'All hail the king.' She made a noise with her lips. 'Here's a kiss for you, king.'
'and here's one for you,' I said. I brought it up from the belt, the sweetest left hook you ever saw in your life. She spun around on her heels and flopped backwards, right into the tub full of dirty bath water. And, jesus, did it make a mess out of her."
( )

This is only the second novel by [a:Jim Thompson|7621|Jim Thompson|https://d.gr-assets.com/authors/1360741132p2/7621.jpg] that I've read. The first one was [b:The Killer Inside Me|18129494|The Killer Inside Me|Jim Thompson|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1403176451s/18129494.jpg|1724756] and I enjoyed it, as I did this one.
The plot is simple and while there are twists, any reader of any of Jim Thompson's novels would expect them. There are no happy endings in his novels.
I would have liked to give it five stars, but it is a little dated. I could tell that it was written in the fifties, before so-called language was allowed in books.
All in all, I would recommended to any fan of crime fiction. ( )