A Rage in Harlem

⚖The case for it

The plot leans hard on coincidence, and Himes lets his gullible hero stumble a few steps behind everyone around him. Weigh that against what he lays down. Harlem in 1957 shows up warm and textured, something crime fiction had mostly skipped, and two cops, Coffin Ed Johnson and Grave Digger Jones, make their entrance. Himes swings from broad comedy into real menace without warning, and the whiplash lands. His nerve never wavers through the chaos, and that steadiness is the payoff.

— the honest librarian

✕The case against

Farce at this velocity flattens people. Jackson stays a dupe for two hundred pages, Imabelle is a prize to be passed around rather than a character, and the violence is slapstick until suddenly it isn't, with acid and razors. Himes's Harlem is electric; his plotting is a runaway hearse.

— the honest librarian