Actually I read this in the Library of America Complete novels, basically on an impulse. Should be in the public domain but I don't think a scan of the first edition is currently available from the big digital libraries. Reading this was in the ambiguous zone between research and leisure--I have a scholarly interest in the production of this "first" hard-boiled novel published by the mainstream trade (?) but I don't think I'll write much about it. Sean McCann has said what needs saying. It wears its Western genre trappings on its sleeve, and the sheer sociopathy of the narrative is impressive.