Raymond Chandler’s Edgar Award winning 1953 novel, The Long Goodbye, was the sixth of his Philip Marlowe mysteries.
While some consider The Big Sleep or Farewell, My Lovely to be Chandler’s finest works, The Long Goodbye is ranked as his best by many critics.
Mystery great Anthony Boucher reviewed the book for the New York Times and described it as “rather off the hard-beaten path of Chandler-tana … both Marlowe and his creator seem to have mellowed somewhat ...”
“On the whole, despite occasional outbursts of violence, it's a moody, brooding book, in which Marlowe is less a detective than a disturbed man of 42 on a quest for some evidence of truth and humanity. The dialogue is as vividly overheated as ever, the plot is clearly constructed and surprisingly resolved, and the book is rich in many sharp glimpses of minor characters and scenes. Perhaps the longest private-eye novel ever written (over 125,000 words!). It is also one of the best -- and may well attract readers who normally shun even the leaders in the field.”
It has been said that the self-pitying author Roger Wade, whom Marlowe has been hired to save from alcohol-fueled self destruction, is an autobiographical character. This is just one of the topics that the Usual Suspects Mystery Reading Group will discuss next Sunday, September 13th, at 2 pm.
New faces are always welcome. To reserve a copy of the book, call 291-4821.
Paul Tremlay has written a Chandler parody called The Little Sleep which features Mark Genevich, a South Boston PI who suffers from narcolepsy. The disease’s most severe symptoms include hypnogogic hallucinations, which wreak havoc for a guy who depends on real-life clues to make his living.
A high-profile case comes his way when Jennifer Times—daughter of the powerful local D.A. and a contestant on American Star— walks into his office with an outlandish story about a man who stole her fingers. He later thinks this may have been a hallucination, but then finds a manila envelope on his desk containing risqué photos of Jennifer.
Kirkus called it “a wacky new take on the genre” and Library Journal said “Tremblay's debut is part noir throwback, part medical mystery, part comedy, and thoroughly, wonderfully entertaining. Highly recommended.”
