Yup, it’s Amos Hatter again. He makes yet another appearance here, this time with his 1952 carny novel Girl of the Midway. This was a natural: we love carny novels, and Hatter specializes in sleazy quasi-romances, which we also like. In this one a naive young woman named Margy Brophy, who works for her father’s merry-go-round concession at an amusement park called Dreamland, gets involved with a man named Bill Tanner who plans to bring a big stage show onto the premises. The carnies fear the show will put some of their concessions out of business, so Margy’s affair is an uncomfortable case of consorting with the enemy. However, Tanner has no intention of stealing customers. He tries but can’t convince the carnies that, given time, his show will actually increase the patronage at their concessions. The battle lines harden, then the most recalcitrant of the carnies is murdered.
The homicide aspect of the book isn’t much of a mystery. You merely have to look past the obvious red herring and choose the next most unpleasant carnival denizen, which you’ll do automatically. But Hatter isn’t a mystery writer anyway. His jam is sexual titillation, and though he does that reasonably well here, at this point we have to accept that he’ll probably never again approach the heights of his Hawaii-based novel Island Girl. Of course, in general, you’re not looking for nail-biting thrills, deep insight, or remarkable literary style with these types of books. They’re meant to give you a semi-boner or three. There are no boners, semi or otherwise, caused by Girl of the Midway. But there’s a good amount of carnival atmosphere, and that was enough for us to enjoy the book. Even so, we can’t recommend it. We do, however, recommend that you appreciate the cover art by Rudy Nappi. It’s perfection.
