Too Hot to Handle

One of Orrie Hitt's darkest novels, Too Hot to Handle focuses on a young woman named Kay who winds up as a high-priced call girl in the late 1950s.

Kay comes from the wrong side of town, Orchard Street, the red light district of sin and booze and crime. At nineteen, she gets a job in a law office and winds up marrying the boss' son, Burt, much to his father's chagrin.

Burt tries opening his own law practice office but business is slim enough to make him and Kay struggle to make rent on their high-end apartment.

Kay meets a married woman named Iris who tells Kay she secretly works as a call girl for a woman, Mrs. Gordon, who only deals with high-end executive businessmen.

With mounting bills, and a sexual appetite scarcely satisfied by her husband Burt, Kay does it. But when she tries to quit, she finds it's not so easy.

This is the ultimate in late-50's sleaze-pulp-noir from the master, Orrie Hitt.