Southerner Jake Perry is a successful, married comicbook artist living the good life in New York in the 1930s. But, bored and restless, he falls under the sway of Bellerophon Cawdor, a ‘Bohemian love-cultist’ in Greenwich Village, and the sadistic, erotic world he offered. Jake can’t let go, pulling his dutiful high-society wife, the beautiful daughter of a wealthy family, into his tragic obsession with forbidden pleasures, trapping them both in a whirlpool that could destroy their lives.
“A strikingly brilliant study of some modern characters who, believing that ‘a living dog is better than a dead lion,’ ride hard and fast through a wild life with no goal and no check on their speed.” The News & Observer (Raliegh, NC)
“Well-written and well-developed,” Pittsburgh Press
“A tense and electric tragedy. What emerges from this novel is one of the most singular and compelling characters in American literature.” Los Angeles Record
“With gleeful sardonicism, Greene sketches this raw, gorgeous story. An exciting and absorbing portrayal of New York’s sophisticated bombast and pose.” Brooklyn Daily Eagle
“Greene has an attractive style and moves his story ahead rapidly. There are flashes of brilliance in this story.” Oakland Tribune
“A bizarre but interesting novel. Greene is a talented and resourceful story-teller and a rather discerning psychologist. Ride the Nightmare is not a book for thin-skinned readers. Greene seems to go out of his way to be realistic at times, as though he were afraid he might be accused of mincing words. It’s all right with us. ” Montclair Times
“A glamorous, swift-moving, and absorbing tale.” The Macon News
Ward Greene /
Historical, Literary Fiction
