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Marlowe is hired by an influential lawyer he's never heard of to tail a gorgeous redhead, but decides he prefers to help out the redhead. She's been acquitted of her alcoholic husband's murder, but her father-in-law prefers not to take the court's word for it.<P><HR>"Chandler wrote like a slumming angel and invested the sun-blinded streets of Los Angeles with a romantic presence."<BR>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;ROSS MACDONALD <P>"Raymond Chandler is a master."<BR>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<I>THE NEW YORK TIMES</I><P>"[Chandler] wrote as if pain hurt and life mattered."<BR>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<I>THE NEW YORKER</I><P>"Chandler seems to have created the culminating American hero: wised up, hopeful, thoughtful, adventurous, sentimental, cynical and rebellious."<BR>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;ROBERT B. PARKER, <I>THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW</I><P>"Philip Marlowe remains the quintessential urban private eye."<BR>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<I>LOS ANGELES TIMES</I><P>"Nobody can write like Chandler on his home turf, not even Faulkner.... An original.... A great artist."<BR>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<I>THE BOSTON BOOK REVIEW</I><P>"Raymond Chandler was one of the finest prose writers of the twentieth century.... Age does not wither Chandler's prose.... He wrote like an angel."<BR>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<I>LITERARY REVIEW</I><P>"[T]he prose rises to heights of unselfconscious eloquence, and we realize with a jolt of excitement that we are in the presence of not a mere action tale teller, but a stylist, a writer with a vision."<BR>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;JOYCE CAROL OATES, <I>THE NEW YORK REVIEW OF BOOKS</I><P>"Chandler wrote like a slumming angel and invested the

"Chandler wrote like a slumming angel and invested the sun-blinded streets of Los Angeles with a romantic presence." Ross Macdonald

"In Chandler's final novel, Marlowe is hired by an influential lawyer he's never heard of to tail a gorgeous redhead, but decides he prefers to help out the redhead. She's been acquitted of her alcoholic husband's murder, but her father-in-law prefers not to take the court's word for it." — Back cover.

Marlowe is hired by an influential lawyer he's never heard of to tail a gorgeous redhead, but decides he prefers to help out the redhead. She's been acquitted of her alcoholic husband's murder, but her father-in-law prefers not to take the court's word for it.

Chandler wrote like a slumming angel and invested the sun-blinded streets of Los Angeles with a romantic presence.

ROSS MACDONALD

Raymond Chandler is a master.

THE NEW YORK TIMES

Chandler] wrote as if pain hurt and life mattered.

THE NEW YORKER

Chandler seems to have created the culminating American hero: wised up, hopeful, thoughtful, adventurous, sentimental, cynical and rebellious.

ROBERT B. PARKER, THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW

Philip Marlowe remains the quintessential urban private eye.

LOS ANGELES TIMES

Nobody can write like Chandler on his home turf, not even Faulkner.... An original.... A great artist.

THE BOSTON BOOK REVIEW

Raymond Chandler was one of the finest prose writers of the twentieth century.... Age does not wither Chandler's prose.... He wrote like an angel.

LITERARY REVIEW

T]he prose rises to heights of unselfconscious eloquence, and we realize with a jolt of excitement that we are in the presence of not a mere action tale teller, but a stylist, a writer with a vision.

JOYCE CAROL OATES, THE NEW YORK REVIEW OF BOOKS

Chandler wrote like a slumming angel and invested the sun-blinded streets of Los Angeles with a romantic presence.

ROSS MACDONALD

Raymond Chandler invented a new way of talking about America, and America has never looked the same to us since.

PAUL AUSTER

Chandler]'s the perfect novelist for our times. He takes us into a different world, a world that's like ours, but isn't.

CAROLYN SEE

A serious rereading of the Marlowe novels and stories yields more surprises than a rereading of Hemingway.

RICHARD RUSSO, AUTHOR OF EMPIRE FALLS

Raymond Chandler was born in Chicago, Illinois, on July 23, 1888, but spent most of his boyhood and youth in England, where he attended Dulwich College and later worked as a freelance journalist for The Westminster Gazette and The Spectator. During World War I, Chandler served in France with the First Division of the Canadian Expeditionary Force, transferring later to the Royal Flying Corps (R. A. F.). In 1919 he returned to the United States, settling in California, where he eventually became director of a number of independent oil companies. The Depression put an end to his business career, and in 1933, at the age of forty-five, he turned to writing, publishing his first stories in Black Mask. By the time he published his first novel, The Big Sleep (1939), featuring, as did all his major works, the iconic private eye Philip Marlowe, it was clear that he had not only mastered a genre but had set a standard to which others could only aspire. Chandler created a body of work that ranks with the best of twentieth-century literature. He died in 1959.