Meeting up with Mildred Pierce

I was so excited to come across Mildred Pierce on the shelf because I remember reading this Slate article by Laura Lippman. "Mildred Pierce is the unicorn of crime fiction," she said, "a noir novel with no murder and very little crime."  Of course I know the movie, but the pulp novel by James Cain is new to me. Lucky for me I'm looking for a C author to read next, but can I read it without seeing/hearing Joan Crawford?