Sometime newspaper sports editor, pulp magazine story writer, "hard-boiled" novelist, screenwriter, and actor, Horace McCoy is best known for his first novel They Shoot Horses, Don't They? (1935), set during a marathon dance contest in the 1930s, and made into a film of the same name in 1969 (directed by Sydney Pollack). He wrote a total of six uncompromising novels (one published posthumously) on themes such as civic corruption, Hollywood, the depression, and the plight of the individual caught in the capitalist machine. His many credits as a screenwriter include The Trail of the Lonesome Pine (1936) and Gentleman Jim (1942).

Further Reading:

Fine, David, editor. Los Angeles in Fiction: A Collection of Original Essays. Albuquerque, University of New Mexico Press, 1984.

Madden, David, editor. Tough Guy Writers of the Thirties. Carbondale, Southern Illinois University Press, 1968.