Hollywood big-shot Vivien Spender has waited ages to produce the work that will be his masterpiece: a film adaptation of Thomas Mann squo;s The Magic Mountain. HeAsquo;s spent years grooming young starlets for the lead role, only to discard each one when a newer, fresher face enters his view. Afterwards, these rejected women all immediately fall from grace; excised from the world of pictures, they end up in rehab, or jail, or worse. But Kitten Agnew, the most recent to encounter this impending doom, wonEsquo;t be gotten rid of so easilyUdash;her contract simply doesnNsquo;t allow for it. Accompanied by Mr. Spender on a train journey from Los Angeles to Chicago, she begins to fear that the producer might be considering a deadly alternative. Either way, itVsquo;s clear that something is going to happen before they reach their destination, and as the train barrels through AmericaLsquo;s heartland, the tension accelerates towards an inescapable finale. Reprinted for the first time in over twenty years, Dread Journey is a taut thriller that exemplifies Dorothy B. HughesAsquo;s greatest strengths as a writerHdash;namely, her sharpened prose and mastery of psychological suspense. While its fine-tuned plot is just as exciting as it was in 1945, when the novel was first published, and its portrayal of Hollywood>squo;s less savory elements remains all-too-relevant today, the bookCsquo;s characters and setting provide pure Golden Age fare, sure to please any devotee of classic mystery novels.
