James "Jim" Harrison (born December 11, 1937) is an American author known for his poetry, fiction, essays, reviews, and writings about food. He has been called "a force of nature", and his work has been compared to that of William Faulkner and Ernest Hemingway. Harrison's characters tend to be rural by birth and to have retained some qualities of their agrarian pioneer heritage by dint of their intelligence and some formal education. They attune themselves to both the natural and the civilized world, surrounded by excesses but determined to live their lives as well as possible.
Harrison was born in Grayling, Michigan, to Winfield Sprague Harrison, a county agricultural agent, and Norma Olivia (Wahlgren) Harrison, both avid readers.
He became blind in one eye after a childhood accident ("My left eye is blind and jogs like/a milky sparrow in its socket"). When he was 21 his father and sister died in an automobile accident. He was educated at Michigan State University where he received his B.A. (1960) and M.A. (1964) in comparative literature. In 1959, he married Linda King, with whom he has two daughters. After a short stint as assistant professor of English at State University of New York, Stony Brook (1965–66), he became a full-time writer. His awards include National Academy of Arts grants (1967, 1968, and 1969), a Guggenheim Fellowship (1969–70), the Spirit of the West Award from the Mountain & Plains Booksellers Association, and election to the American Academy of Arts and Letters (2007).
Plot
Two terrible lounge singers get booked to play a gig in a Moroccan hotel but somehow become pawns in an international power play between the CIA, the Emir of Ishtar, and the rebels trying to overthrow his regime.
Keywords: africa, airport, amateur-musician, arab, arrogance, aspiring-musician, awkwardness, bad-nightclub-singer, bad-singing, ballpoint-pen
CIA Agent: Jim, I don't know what you had in mind here, but this mission is no longer covert. We are now overtly firing on two Americans and God knows who else. And they are armed to the teeth!
Jim Harrison: Sir? We did NOT fire on two Americans in the desert. We did NOT. Who told you that? The Secretary of State? Well, how would he know?
Chuck Clarke: Either shoot me or lower your voice.
Shirra Assel: This is an ancient devious world, and you come from a young country. Promise me you will keep my secret without trying to understand it.
Chuck Clarke: You mean you bought a camel?::Lyle Rogers: No, I didn't really buy it. They SOLD it to me!::Lyle Rogers: Oh no. I think that something went wrong and now I own a blind camel. A blind camel!
Lyle Rogers: You didn't have to leave with me, now I've spoiled the night for you.::Chuck Clarke: You gotta give yourself a break! You've never been out with anyone but your wife.::Lyle Rogers: Yeah, but you gotta have the looks, Chuck. I mean, you walk into a place like that and girls just want ya, ya know, ya got that kinda face. Kinda mean lookin' but with character. And the way you walk, you can only do that with a small body! Didya ever hear of a big sports car? I mean, if I'd look like you...::Chuck Clarke: Oh, you so idealize me!
Lyle Rogers: You didn't have to leave with me, now I've spoiled the night for you.::Chuck Clarke: You gotta give yourself a break! You've never been out with anyone but your wife.::Lyle Rogers: Yeah, but you gotta have the looks, Chuck. I mean, you walk into a place like that and girls just want ya, ya know, ya got that kinda face. Kinda mean lookin' but with character. And the way you walk, you can only do that with a small body! Didya ever hear of a big sports car? I mean, if I'd look like you -...::Chuck Clarke: Oh, you so idealize me!
Lyle Rogers: [to Chuck] It takes a lot of nerve to have nothing at your age, don't you understand that? Most guys'd be ashamed, but you've got the guts to just say 'to hell with it'. You say that you'd rather have nothing than settle for less, understand?
Shirra Assel: The birds in the desert eat only flesh, and there is no wind.
Chuck Clarke: Take one sip at a time. That water has to last you about another 48 minutes.::Lyle Rogers: Why, what happens then?::Chuck Clarke: We run out of water.
Plot
L.A. private eye Sam Black, who lives with his half-brother, Andrew, travels to the Bahamas to assist Abigail Marx, a woman who believes her husband is stealing money from their company. Black finds the proof but in the process is shot by Harry Marx. While recuperating in a Bahamas hospital he meets a beautiful widow, also from L.A., named Martha Greenwood. Back in California, Black reunites with Martha who tells him the money left her by her late husband is controlled by unscrupulous business manager, Robert Chandler. Together Black and Martha devise a scheme to transfer the money away from Chandler's control. Black carries out his part of this scheme but then discovers that Martha has plans of her own.
Keywords: bahamas, embezzlement, independent-film, los-angeles, money, murder, private-detective, theft
Plot
It's been two weeks of unrelenting New York City summer heat. Sooner or later the boys are apt to get into mischief, so Knuckles takes the load of 'em to Algy's father's camp in the mountains. The trip gets sidetracked when they cross paths with Judge Parker' party on the road. The Judge, hiding from the mob, is desperately heading to his mountain manor when he runs the boys' vehicle off the road, nearly disabling it right before his own car conks out. With only the boys' car barely able to travel, they all wind up at the judge's manor where ghostly sightings, spooky organ music, death threats and a creepy housekeeper await them. Judge Parker is the very judge who once nearly put Knuckles on death row for murder. When the judge turns up dead, Knuckles is in trouble again, with little brother Danny and the gang ready to help him out.
Keywords: adirondack-mountains, bodyguard, bowery-boys, brother, cake, camp, cigar-smoking, cook, court, dead-end-kids
The Story Of Men In The Making By Just Plain American Boys!
Algy: Where's Knuckles? Isn't he is gonna to eat?::Danny: He's takin' a bath.::Muggs: That kid's gonna get sick from washin' himself so much.
Judge Parker: You can eat later.::Simp: Aw, gee, and I was so hungry.::Pete: Oh, why don't you eat?::Simp: He ain't paying me for that.
Muggs: Five millions guys thumbin' their way along the road and we gotta pick up a judge. That's fate.
Muggs: I think this organ has sumpin' t' do with the secret. You know, we heard it moanin' just before that ghost showed up. Then Agnes says "not to touch it." And Knuckles said Miss Mason was to meet him in this room. She vanished from this room. I'll betcha there's a secret panel.::Danny: You're crazy. You've been seein' so many movies.::Muggs: Movies - that's it! Say, what's The Thin Man got that I ain't got?::Danny: Myrna Loy.
[Louise dreads going to the judge's gloomy mountain mansion]::Simp: [nervously] Is it haunted, Miss Louise?::Louise Mason: I don't think so, but it needs a good ghost to give it a little life.
Scruno: [seeing a graveyard at the Judge's estate] G-g-ghosts!::Judge Parker: That graveyard has stood there for centuries. All my wife's ancestors are buried there. So is she. It's exclusively for the family.::Scruno: Mister, you has my word, I-I won't intrude on your family.
Skinny: [following Agnus upstairs] Feel just like Snow White.::Skinny: [to Danny] If she gives ya an apple, don't eat it.
Giles: You'd like for something to happen to Louise, wouldn't you? With Louise out of the way, your slow embezzling of her fortune would never be found out.::Judge Parker: And with me out of the way you could get ahold of her and her money.
Judge Parker: Say, haven't I seen you somewhere before?::Knuckles Dolan: Yes, sir. I was on trial in your court. I'm Knuckles Dolan.::Judge Parker: Knuckles Dolan?::Knuckles Dolan: That's right. You sentenced me to death for murder. I was innocent, afterwards exonerated. Remember? I'm up here with the boys, their guardian.::Judge Parker: [to Giles] He's up here to murder me.
Knuckles Dolan: This place would drive anybody drip-dizzy and you're no exception.