I’m always a fan of pulpy novels featuring predatory female figures. This one’s particularly good, with both a sultry blonde and a tough as nails older woman. However, the catchy line above the title – “She lured him into the world’s oldest trap’ – is a bit puzzling.
The luring part is fairly obvious, given the flashed leg and low cut top. But what’s the world’s oldest trap? In modern internet slang that would imply that the older woman was packing a penis in her panties. Given the context though, I doubt that’s it. Marriage doesn’t make sense, as that’s a relatively modern social idea. The same goes for monogamous coupling and child rearing. I’ve got to think that the world’s oldest trap is a pit covered in branches. That’s how they used to catch woolly mammoths after all. It seems an odd way to catch a guy, but it’s the only thing that makes sense to me. I guess it might still be better than relying on your OK Cupid profile.
Often this kind of pulp cover is associated with some fairly poor fiction. But this story is actually by the great Jim Thompson. I’ve not read this particular novel, but he’s famous for such works as The Getaway, The Grifters and The Killer Inside Me. He also collaborated with Kubrick on The Killing and Paths of Glory (although didn’t receive proper credit). If you’re a fan of the pulp crime genre he’s definitely an author worth exploring.