The Continental Op Series 1-2

Dashiell Hammett’s Continental Op novels—Red Harvest and The Dain Curse—feature his anonymous hardboiled detective from the Continental Detective Agency, a cynical professional who exposes the brutality beneath America’s modern world.

In Red Harvest, the Op is sent to Personville—nicknamed “Poisonville”—a mining town riddled with corruption, gang violence, and political rot. Hired to clean up the city, he manipulates rival gangs and crooked officials against one another in a ruthless campaign for justice. The result is a grim, blood-soaked satire of American greed and moral decay. Hammett’s terse prose and unflinching realism make it a landmark of noir fiction.

In The Dain Curse, the Op investigates a series of bizarre crimes surrounding the wealthy Dain family and a young woman apparently cursed by her lineage. The mystery blends murder, drug addiction, and cultish deception. Through cold efficiency and moral toughness, the Op strips away superstition to expose human corruption.

Together, these novels define the birth of hardboiled detective fiction. The Continental Op—unsentimental yet honorable—embodies Hammett’s vision of a detective shaped by violence but guided by an unbreakable sense of duty in a world without heroes.