The Devil Raises His Own by Scott Phillips
The Devil Raises His Own is replete with characters that are lewd, crude and socially unacceptable racing towards H E double Toothpicks with little or no chance of redemption with the possible exception of the admirable boardinghouse cook, housekeeper and widowed Mrs. Chen. Her only unforgivable “sin” in the eyes of her family who promptly disavowed her was when years ago she married a Chinese railroad laborer.
Debauchery, violence and a plethora of casually committed and unsolved murders occurring much too often to tally are hallmarks of this clever work of fiction. The novel is set in 1916 Hollywood in cheap apartments, a warehouse film studio, railway yards and the back alleys of Los Angeles, California where finer people don’t venture.
Bawdy, raunchy with language as vulgar as uttered in the television series Deadwood renowned for its shocking and anachronistic overuse of obscenities, Scott Phillips’ new novel redeems itself by merit of fine writing and laugh out loud outrageous humor. This is not a book to recommend to your evangelical pastor, spiritual leader or genteel book clubs.
Lewd, Crude, and Completely Unforgivable
Author Scott Phillips acknowledges the title The Devil Raises His Own was borrowed from an eponymous song written by singer/songwriter Freedy Johnson formerly of Kinsley, Kansas, on his 2010 album Rain on the City and is not as he had assumed a commonly used expression. This novel is the third book in a loosely structured series of Wild West/New Frontiers gritty noirs that began in 2004 with the publication of Cottonwood featuring protagonist Bill Ogden.
He was a veteran of the Grand Old Army who joined up in 1862 as a youthful defender of the union or was perhaps reluctantly drafted. There is no need to be concerned if you have not read the previous two as it will not hamper your enjoyment of this recent addition. Cottonwood was set in the same named small Kansas community about a decade after the Civil War.
Bill Ogden is an ambitious saloon owner and photographer who associates himself with a wealthy developer and his wife before getting mixed up with the “Bloody Benders”, a bizarre family of possibly cannibalistic serial killers. His wife is more comfortable in the company of another man which ultimately leads Bill into a messy affair and bigamy but that’s a long story for another time.
Scott Phillips returned to the rollicking adventures of roguish hero Bill Ogden, also known as Bill Sadlaw in Hop Alley (2014). The year is 1878 and he is running a photography studio in Denver’s Chinatown. Single again but not legally divorced from either wife, he is occupied with affairs, exciting adventures, a riot and a steadily rising body count. Time passes.
From Portraits to Blue Films
The Devil Raises His Own opens dramatically the week before Christmas, 1915 in a shoddy apartment above a movie house in Wichita, Kansas. Flavia Ogden Purcell, Bill Ogden’s 25 year-old granddaughter, waits impatiently for her drunken, belligerent husband to return from another spree. Provoked beyond measure and observing him loading a revolver, the former tomboy retrieved her precious Louisville slugger from their wardrobe, wound up for the strike, swung with all her might and cracked Albert Purcell solidly across the temple.
The gun fired at the moment of impact but the bullet went wild. Movie house projectionist Ernie could testify to the loud quarrels and the brutish mien of Albert. Saloon patrons and the bartender would confirm his history of misbehavior. Clearly this was a case of self-defense and the city attorney declined to file charges. Unfortunately, Flavia lost her job as a Latin and Greek teacher at Wichita High School as a result of her now tarnished reputation.
Granddad Bill Ogden had settled in Los Angeles after many nomadic years and established another photographic studio specializing in portraiture while his womanizing ways continued unabated. He may be in his ‘70’s but his sex appeal remains undiminished. Having trained her as a photographer and technician, he had previously suggested she come live with him in sunny California and work in his studio. 1916 would be a year of new opportunities and a fine time to make a move west.
Murder, Mayhem, and Unexpected Love in a Dangerous World
It’s a short hop from legitimate portrait photography to the nude and somewhat risqué photographs Bill Ogden had previously only dabbled in to the production of blue movies or one-reel stag films made for and purchased by discreet clientele. It’s a federal offense to send them through the postal service yet nevertheless plain brown wrappers wend their way to fraternal organizations, brothels, and campus fraternities as well as well-heeled individual collectors of pornography.
Louis Daguerre introduced his new technology of photography to the French Academy of Sciences in 1839. Wasting no time, aficionados of the human form introduced nude photography in 1840. The earliest surviving bluish movie is considered to be an 1896 seven minute bathroom striptease. “Fatima’s Coochie-coochie dance”, a nickelodeon kinescope, was filmed the same year. Argentina served as the early 20th century center for pornographic film production.
Amateur and professional American early filmmakers quickly joined in despite laws preventing the making and selling of obscene material making it a crime punishable by jail sentence.
Hollywood’s Most Memorable Characters
Readers will soon meet a rascally passel of memorable characters such as wannabe film stars including Purity Dove (rhymes with actual silent screen star Bessie Love) and Jack Strong. Trudy Crombie is a failed prostitute and a deserted wife with two young children who was soon to find success with Victoria as a partner in same-sex stag films.
There are entrepreneurs George and Irene Buntnagle, a lavender married couple who partner with Bill Ogden in writing, creating, directing and accelerating production of blue films. Utilizing a former warehouse as their studio and mail order processing center, they are soon generating impressive income for all participants. Bill’s new photography lab assistant Henry found his way to Los Angeles from a good but impoverished Christian home in West Virginia, led to him after befriending Ezra Crombie while sharing a freight car heading west.
Ezra had uncharacteristically saved Henry’s life in a railroad switch yard. Henry is Everyman, benign, honest, uneducated but intelligent and hard-working; easily the most endearing character in The Devil Raises His Own. He falls in love with Flavia who improbably reciprocates. On the other end of the spectrum is notorious psychopath Ezra who is a one-man walking slaughterhouse with a body count that is impossibly high. He murders for side-eye glances, as part of robberies he commits, or just because he encounters someone who mildly annoys him; much like 1930’s desperado, the notorious Baby Face Nelson. His weapons of choice are claw hammers, iron pipes, a shiv, or guns if handy. Ezra is dangerous even when unarmed and he is Trudy’s estranged husband on a mission to reunite with his “loving family.”
There are many other colorful, volatile personalities who wander through this seedy underworld. It’s a thriller marked with surprises and a rare happy ending for a few of the denizens.
About Scott Phillips:
Scott Phillips was born in Wichita, Kansas, educated at Wichita State University where he studied French Literature and Creative Writing, taught and mentored by Professor James Lee Burke. He worked as a bookseller, photographer and translator who lived in France for several years ultimately settling in St. Louis, Missouri. His debut novel was The Ice Harvest (2000), a New York Times Notable Book of the Year which also won the California Book Award and was made into a hit film in 2005 co-starring John Cusack and Billy Bob Thornton. This best-selling, multiple award winning author may not always produce books that are good clean fun but a reader will surely be well entertained.
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