Hellbox

by John O'Hara

This book is a collection of twenty-six stories featuring a broad range of typical O'Hara characters: the big shots, the lovelies, the brassy wits, the clucks, the operators, the sharp, the weary, and the disillusioned. These characters are rendered with colour, detail, and passion in true O'Hara style. His stories are both splendid and appalling; but always readable. O'Hara has been called a photographic observer of American urban life.

Genres: Short Stories, Fiction

200 pages, Hardcover

First published August 1, 1947

About the author

American writer John Henry O'Hara contributed short stories to the New Yorker and wrote novels, such as BUtterfield 8 (1935) and Ten North Frederick (1955).

Best-selling works of John Henry O'Hara include Appointment in Samarra . People particularly knew him for an uncannily accurate ear for dialogue. O'Hara, a keen observer of social status and class differences, wrote frequently about the socially ambitious.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_O&#...

Reviews

[Daniel Polansky]

A collection of stories about over the hill drunks, small time criminals, cheating husbands, etc. Very of its time, but well-written and engaging as hell. O'Hara has a real feel for dialogue, and despite its masculine preoccupation, doesn't have that authorial intrusion you get in Hemingway and Mailer and writers of that ilk. Fun stuff.

[JB · Rating 3 out of 5]

If you're a fan of Salinger's northeastern, urban settings but could do without the depth or backstory then take a quick highball sipping, suit wearing, cigarette smoking in a doctor's office stroll through these stories. Believe, the stroll will be quick indeed. Most stories in this collection are a maximum five pages, front and back, and the omnipotent narration and terse dialog propels you along like rush hour foot traffic. Everyone has an angle, no matter how subtle, and these stories depict the exploitation and exposure of the characters in vivid but plain language so well that it's almost as if you've read someone's mind as they walked by on their way to work.

The term "hellbox" comes from the days of manual printing. It was where the few letters that make up all the words were kept when not in the rack. When automation and linotype made printing easier, the hellbox became the place where broken or ugly words were kept until they could be destroyed and reformed.

[Elizabeth · Rating 3 out of 5]

Hard to rate since these are so dated, but that is what made them interesting to me.

[Robert · Rating 3 out of 5]

I know that O'Hara is considered one of the greatest American short story writers. I think I read some way back when. This book, however, should be titled "vignettes." Each one is just 2 to 6 pages long. They are interesting, but the characters and the scenes are so dated, they are hard to take seriously. I was surprised to see that his characters are so "hard-boiled." There were a few of them that I would have liked to know what happened, but not many.