Horace McCoy (Author of They Shoot Horses, Don't They?)
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Horace McCoy

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Horace McCoy


Born
in Pegram, Tennessee, The United States
April 14, 1897

Died
December 15, 1955

Website

Genre
Mystery & Thrillers


Horace Stanley McCoy (1897–1955) was an American novelist whose gritty, hardboiled novels documented the hardships Americans faced during the Depression and post-war periods. McCoy grew up in Tennessee and Texas; after serving in the air force during World War I, he worked as a journalist, film actor, and screenplay writer, and is author of five novels including They Shoot Horses, Don’t They? (1935) and the noir classic Kiss Tomorrow Goodbye (1948). Though underappreciated in his own time, McCoy is now recognized as a peer of Dashiell Hammett and James Cain. He died in Beverly Hills, California, in 1955.

Combine Editions

Average rating: 3.87 · 12,262 ratings · 1,262 reviews · 26 distinct works • Similar authors
They Shoot Horses, Don't They?
3.86 avg rating — 10,070 ratings — published 1935 — 98 editions
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Kiss Tomorrow Goodbye
3.87 avg rating — 466 ratings — published 1948 — 13 editions
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I Should Have Stayed Home
3.64 avg rating — 478 ratings — published 1938 — 26 editions
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No Pockets in a Shroud
3.44 avg rating — 240 ratings — published 1937 — 68 editions
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Загнанных лошадей пристрели...
by
3.76 avg rating — 63 ratings — 4 editions
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Four Novels: They Shoot Hor...
4.10 avg rating — 20 ratings — published 1983 — 6 editions
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Corruption City
3.09 avg rating — 23 ratings — published 1959 — 21 editions
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Scalpel
3.65 avg rating — 17 ratings — published 1952 — 13 editions
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The Mopper-Up
3.33 avg rating — 9 ratings — published 2011 — 3 editions
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The Collected Horace McCoy
3.86 avg rating — 7 ratings — published 2014
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More books by Horace McCoy…
Quotes by Horace McCoy  (?)
Quotes are added by the Goodreads community and are not verified by Goodreads. (Learn more)

“It's peculiar to me,' she said, 'that everybody pays so much attention to living and so little to dying. Why are these high-powered scientists always screwing around trying to prolong life instead of finding pleasant ways to end it? There must be a hell of a lot of people in the world like me--who want to die but haven't got the guts.”
― Horace McCoy
tags: dying, euthanasia, guts, living, pleasant, prolong, science, scientists, suicide
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“there is no new experience in life. something may happen to you that you think has never happened before, that you think is brand new, but you are mistaken. you have only to see or smell or hear or feel a certain something and you will discover that this experience you thought was new has happened before.”
― Horace McCoy, They Shoot Horses, Don't They?
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“Let's go sit and hate a bunch of people.”
― Horace McCoy
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Polls

April 2022 Short Story/Novella Poll

 
  49 votes, 29.9%

 
  36 votes, 22.0%

 
  33 votes, 20.1%

 
  20 votes, 12.2%

 
  12 votes, 7.3%

Jamilia by Chingiz Aitmatov 96 pages, 1958
 
  9 votes, 5.5%

Essential Stories, Single Story (you make your own life) by V.S. Pritchett, 6 pages, 1938
 
  5 votes, 3.0%

164 total votes
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Topics Mentioning This Author

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The Seasonal Read...: This topic has been closed to new comments. 10.9 ("A lovely horse is always an experience.... It is an emotional experience of the kind that is spoiled by words.") 52 190 May 28, 2010 08:50PM  
Challenge: 50 Books: Lauli's reads in 2011 58 99 Dec 31, 2011 03:12PM  
The Seasonal Read...: This topic has been closed to new comments. Winter Challenge 2011: Completed Tasks -DO NOT DELETE ANY POSTS IN THIS TOPIC 2888 776 Feb 29, 2012 09:03PM  
The Seasonal Read...: This topic has been closed to new comments. Winter Challenge 2012-2013: Completed Tasks - DO NOT DELETE ANY POSTS IN THIS TOPIC 2512 852 Feb 28, 2013 09:01PM  
Reading with Style: This topic has been closed to new comments. Summer 2013 RwS Completed Tasks - Summer 2013 662 126 Aug 31, 2013 09:06PM  
Challenge: 50 Books: Diane's doing it again in 2013 38 129 Jan 07, 2014 12:29AM  
The Seasonal Read...: This topic has been closed to new comments. Completed Tasks (Do Not Delete Posts) 2561 633 Aug 01, 2014 02:12PM  
Pulp Fiction: July 2014 - They Shoot Horses, Don't They? 17 76 Aug 02, 2014 11:16AM  
Reading with Style: This topic has been closed to new comments. FA 2014 RwS Completed Tasks - Fall 2014 1039 173 Nov 30, 2014 09:04PM  
Mount TBR 2014 Ch...: Ellinor on her way to Mars 133 73 Jan 03, 2015 08:59AM