Review: The Postman Always Rings Twice

The Postman Always Rings Twice by James M. Cain
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

What a hard hitting book. I have no words to describe how I felt throughout and after finishing it. However the climax was sort of pre determined and I wished something like that happened. No doubt it was sad but it was fitting. You can call it poetic justice.


There is a down on luck bastard Frank Chambers. He meets a Greek one fine day and start working for him. Her sexy siren wife Cora and frank had sexual sparks. They start a steamy affair and plan to kill Nick Papadakis.
Their plan backfires and they vow never to do that again.

"We must have been crazy. Just plain crazy." "Just our dumb luck that pulled us through." "It was my fault." "Mine too."
"No, it was my fault. I was the one that thought it up. You didn't want to. Next time I'll listen to you, Frank. You're smart. You're not dumb like I am." "Except there won't be any next time." "That's right. Never again." "Even if we had gone through with it they would have guessed it. They _always_ guess it. They guess it anyway, just from habit. Because look how quick that cop knew something was wrong. That's what makes my blood run cold. Soon as he saw me standing there he knew it. If he could tumble to it all that easy, how much chance would we have had if the Greek had died?" "I guess I'm not really a hell cat, Frank."

"I'm telling you." "If I was, I wouldn't have got scared so easy. I was _so_ scared, Frank." "I was scared plenty, myself." "You know what I wanted when the lights went out? Just you, Frank. I wasn't any hell cat at all, then. I was just a little girl, afraid of the dark." "I was there, wasn't I?" "I loved you for it. If it hadn't been for you, I don't know what would have happened to us." "Pretty good, wasn't it? About how he slipped?" "And he believed it."

"Give me half a chance, I got it on the cops, every time. You got to have something to tell, that's it. You got to fill in all those places, and yet have it as near the truth as you can get it. I know them. I've tangled with them, plenty." "You fixed it. You're always going to fix it for me, aren't you, Frank?" "You're the only one ever meant anything to me." "I guess I really don't want to be a hell cat." "You're my baby."

"That's it, just your dumb baby. All right, Frank. I'll listen to you, from now on. You be the brains, and I'll work. I can work, Frank. And I work good. We'll get along." "Sure we will." "Now shall we go to sleep?" "You think you can sleep all right?" "It's the first time we ever slept together, Frank."

They try to run away but Cora comes back. Frank runs away but Greek brings him back. Then they could not stick to their plan and kills him. They gets off from court on a technicality but then everything is not the same.


"We kept that up for six months. We kept it up, and it was always the same way. We'd have a fight, and I'd reach for the bottle. What we had the fights about was going away. We couldn't leave the state until the suspended sentence was up, but after that I meant we should blow. I didn't tell her, but I wanted her a long way from Sackett. I was afraid if she got sore at me for something, she'd go off her nut and spill it like she had that other time, after the arraignment. I didn't trust her for a minute. At first, she was all hot for going too, specially when I got talking about Hawaii and the South Seas, but then the money began to roll in. When we opened up, about a week after the funeral, people flocked out there to see what she looked like, and then they came back because they had a good time. And she got all excited about here was our chance to make some more money."


I want to hate them for the crime they committed. But I could not. Why is it that? It maybe the author. He made us feel their desperation nd the curse of poverty. They are torturing themselves and each other.



"She gave me a funny look and went upstairs. It kept up all day, me following her around for fear she'd call up Sackett, her following me around for fear I'd skip. We never opened the place up at all. In between the tip-toeing around, we would sit upstairs in the room. We didn't look at each other. We looked at the puma. It would meow and she would go down to get it some milk. I would go with her. After it lapped up the milk it would go to sleep. It was too young to play much. Most of the time it meowed or slept."     

Frank started having weird dreams. Cruel and horrible. Why? Did he after all had a conscience? And what about Cora?


"That night we lay side by side, not saying a word. I must have slept, because I had those dreams. Then, all of a sudden, I woke up, and before I was even really awake I was running downstairs. What had waked me was the sound of that telephone dial. She was at the extension in the lunchroom, all dressed, with her hat on, and a packed hat box on the floor beside her. I grabbed the receiver and slammed it on the hook. I took her by the shoulders, jerked her through the swing door, and shoved her upstairs. "Getup there! Get up there, or I'll--"     

  "Or you'll what?"  The telephone rang, and I answered it.      

"Here's your party, go ahead."   
   "Yellow Cab."      
"Oh. Oh. I called you, Yellow Cab, but I've changed my mind. I won't need you."     
  "O.K."


Do they love each other? I guess so.. That is why Frank had an affair but didn't run away and Cora didn't report him. But they both knew they did something horrible and couldn't forget it. They are after all not bad people but they did a horrible murder.

In the end their death was not a tragedy for them,. In fact death was their salvation.


Father McConnell says I have, and I want to see her. I want her to know that it was all so, what we said to each other, and that I didn't do it. What did she have that makes me feel that way about her? I don't know. She wanted something, and she tried to get it. She tried all the wrong ways, but she tried. I don't know what made her feel that way about me, because she knew me. She called it on me plenty of times, that I wasn't any good. I never really wanted anything, but her. But that's a lot. I guess it's not often that a woman even has that.





There's a guy in No. 7 that murdered his brother, and says he didn't really do it, his subconscious did it. I asked him what that meant, and he says you got two selves, one that you know about and the other that you don't know about, because it's subconscious. It shook me up. Did I really do it, and not know it? God Almighty, I can't believe that! I didn't do it! I loved her so, then, I tell you, that I would have died for her! To hell with the subconscious. I don't believe it. It's just a lot of hooey, that this guy thought up so he could fool the judge. You know what you're doing, and you do it. I didn't do it, I know that. That's what I'm going to tell her, if I ever see her again.       I'm up awful tight, now. I think they give you dope in the grub, so you don't think about it. I try not to think. Whenever I can make it, I'm out there with Cora, with the sky above us, and the water around us, talking about how happy we're going to be, and how it's going to last forever. I guess I'm over the big river, when I'm there with her. That's when it seems real, about another life, not with all this stuff how Father McConnell has got it figured out. When I'm with her I believe it. When I start to figure, it all goes blooey.       No stay.       Here they come. Father McConnell says prayers help. If you've got this far, send up one for me, and Cora, and make it that we're together, wherever it is.

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