Desert Town

by Ramona Stewart

DESERT TOWN is dark crime fiction for those who have a taste for the perverse and violent. It was made into a major film, DESERT FURY, starring Burt Lancaster, Lizabeth Scott and Mary Astor. It's the story of seventeen year old Paula Haller's transition into womanhood as she defies her mother, Fritzi's dominance. Fritzi runs the small town of Chuckawalla including the Purple Sage casino and saloon as well as a bordello or two. Fritzi can control everything but Paula and the tension between the two is drawn as tight as a drum. The scenery includes sprawling ranches, a very much out of place colonial mansion and the vast beauty of the desert. Mix in a notorious gangster, his insanely jealous torpedo, a love triangle, the town sheriff, some weirdly eccentric characters and innuendo aplenty. Once the sun brings all these ingredients to a boil you've got the backdrop for a noir setting like no other.

Paperback

First published February 9, 2014

About the author

Ramona Stewart was best known for her 1946 novel Desert Town and the 1970 supernatural thriller The Possession of Joel Delaney, both of which were adapted into films.

Stewart was born in San Francisco, California in 1922, the daughter of James Oliver Stewart and Theresa Waugh. She grew up in Los Angeles with her father, a promoter of silver mines. She was of Irish descent. Stewart attended the University of Southern California from 1938 until 1941.

Her first published works were serialized stories for Collier's magazine. The first of them, first published as "Bitter Harvest" from November 24 to December 8, 1945, was quickly optioned by Hollywood producer Hal B. Wallis and became the basis of Desert Fury, a film noir by Lewis Allen starring Lizabeth Scott, John Hodiak, and Burt Lancaster. Stewart later developed the story into her first full-length novel with the title Desert Town.

After this early success, Stewart continued to submit material to Collier's, often coming-of-age stories that were popular in the slicks. She wouldn't publish another novel until 1962, The Stars Abide. This was followed by several other books sharing the themes she had established in her debut: odd love triangles, dysfunctional families, and more or less explicit homosexual relationships. At least one of those books, The Surprise Party Complex, dealing with disenchanted teenagers living in Hollywood, seems to have been turned into a spec script, but no film was produced.

After a detour toward the historical novel with Casey in 1968, Stewart finally settled as an author of thrillers with supernatural elements in the 1970s, starting with The Possession of Joel Delaney, which became her second title to be adapted into a film, directed by Waris Hussein and starring Shirley MacLaine and Perry King.

Stewart's final novel, The Nightmare Candidate, was published in 1980. For much of her adult life she resided with her husband in Key West, Florida, where she died in 2006.

While Desert Town has been marketed as an early example of pulp fiction, Stewart's early novels in particular have been praised for the depth hidden beneath the raunchy dialogue and the relationships between innocent females and almost clichéd males. Author and poet Sarah Key wrote that Stewart's female characters were "ahead of their time, often outcasts from conventional society, sometimes aided by supernatural forces".

Stewart's work is also noted for its early depictions of homosexual relationships. Noir expert Eddie Muller called the film adaptation of Desert Town "the gayest movie ever produced in Hollywood's golden era".

-Wikipedia

Reviews

[Chris · Rating 3 out of 5]

Strange hybrid of small-town melodrama, western setting, and noir plot---"soap opera noir." Paula Haller is blossoming into womanhood under the watchful eye of her domineering mother Fritzi, who operates the local dens of sin---an illegal casino, brothels, liquor stores. Everything in her life changes when Eddie Benedict and his pal Johnny, two big-shot racketeers, roll into town; Paula falls hard for the forty-something Eddie, and against her mother’s orders, establishes an ongoing affair with him. Johnny is less than pleased about this development; same for Fritizi, and Luke, the only decent lawman in town who keeps a close eye on Paula. This troublesome relationship with Eddie will either kill Paula, or become her redemption…

The novel's core is a three-way love triangle between Eddie and Paula, with Johnny acting as spoiler since he needs his partner Johnny's mind in the game. He's gone to jail once for Eddie, and won't let some girl get between them. Coming-of-age and small-town melodrama creates tension between Paula and Johnny, and then Paula and her mother. A lot to the novel, but for whatever reason it didn't quite grab me. Stewart’s prose tries hard to be lyrical/poetic; at times it comes close to greatness, and other times descends to become overwrought and purplish. She pens a competent story, a unique novel that's kind of case-study in amorality as Paula runs off and follows the bad apple her mother tried to keep her away from. Thus an interesting read, even if it didn't floor me.

Full review found here.

[Steven · Rating 3 out of 5]

A shorter version, serialized in two issues of Collier's magazine in 1945, was made into Desert Fury, a pretty good 1947 film noir that featured Burt Lancaster in the role of Tom Hansen, the ex-rodeo star turned sadistic deputy. The movie breaks free from Ramona Stewart's original plot and in all ways is more hard-edged and darker, especially in its conclusion. After the movie appeared, Stewart went back and expanded her original story into this novel length version, and she remained true to her original story line. Although the narrative roams freely from character to character, with enough back story and motivation to give all the characters arcs, the novel is clearly focused on 17-year old Paula's coming of age. To get there she must break free from her domineering mother, Fritzi, who has the sin business - the saloon, brothel, liquor store, casino - in the small town cornered, which effectively gives her control of the town, especially with the Sheriff on her payroll. But this criminal aspect is all back story and periphery and laid out in the first half of the novel. The story picks up in energy when Johnny and Eddie, two gangster types, roll into town. Paula quickly falls for the 40-something Eddie. Kisses are described and it is clear things go much further. And thus begins the battle of wills that takes up the rest of the novel as Stewart exploits two triangle relationships: Johnny, Paula, Eddie and Eddie, Paula, Fritzi. Although the novel has noir elements, it is not a noir in the way the film version is, and is much more focused on the relationships. The descriptive writing gets a bit over the top at times, but there's a lot of great scenes, and it's easy to see why the original magazine story was quickly picked up to be filmed. A Kindle version is available, so well worth checking out.

[Michael Ritchie · Rating 4 out of 5]

I came to this from the 1947 Technicolor western film noir Desert Fury, which was based on this story. There are some differences, most notably that there are a few more characters to keep track of in the book, and a couple of backstories are different, but both are well worth experiencing. Noir expert Eddie Muller says that Desert Fury is the most homoerotic noir ever, and he may be right, though the two actors who play the parts, John Hodiak and Wendell Corey, don't have much heat between them. But their odd relationship is intact in the book. The main story is the same here: a young woman battles with her overpowering mother in a small western town, over her right to determine her future, and her right to date a shady older man. Well written pulp and a fast read.

[Katie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Absolutely wonderful, and far nastier than the film adaptation. It’s much less of a romance than a melancholy coming-of-age, and it works much better that way.

I only wish the e-book edition had been better edited, because it’s pretty much the only way to get this novel now, and the typos are many and glaring.