I SHOULD HAVE STAYED HOME by...

I SHOULD HAVE STAYED HOME by Horace McCoy (Midnight Classics/ Serpent’s Tail: $11.99; 184 pp.). Originally published in 1938, this gritty novel by the author of “They Shoot Horses, Don’t They?” offers a dark look at the world of Hollywood wannabes during the heyday of the studios. Ralph Carson, a handsome, would-be actor from Georgia, and his friend Mona Matthews cling to a marginal existence as extras, but their clumsy naivete prevents them from realizing their dreams of stardom. Ralph refuses the advances of a wealthy, nymphomaniac widow; Mona gets involved in union politics. Still clinging to his hopes, Ralph declares, “I did not want to get out on the streets and see what the sun had to show me, a cheap town, filled with cheap stores and cheap people, like the town I had left.”