The Big Sleep -- Raymond Chandler, Paperback

The iconic first novel from crime fiction master Raymond Chandler, featuring Philip Marlowe, the quintessential urban private eye (Los Angeles Times).

A dying millionaire hires private eye Philip Marlowe to handle the blackmailer of one of his two troublesome daughters, and Marlowe finds himself involved with more than extortion. Kidnapping, pornography, seduction, and murder are just a few of the complications he gets caught up in.

Author: Raymond Chandler
Publisher: Vintage Crime/Black Lizard
Published: 07/12/1988
Pages: 240
Binding Type: Paperback
Weight: 0.58lbs
Size: 8.00h x 5.20w x 0.70d
ISBN: 9780394758282

Review Citation(s):
Library Journal 07/01/2002 pg. 128
Booklist 11/15/2002 pg. 577
Men's Journal 12/01/2007 pg. 96
Library Journal 07/15/2002
Entertainment Weekly 07/05/2013 pg. 103

About the Author
Raymond Thornton Chandler (1888 - 1959) was the master practitioner of American hard-boiled crime fiction. Although he was born in Chicago, Chandler 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 career, and in 1933, at the age of forty-five, he turned to writing fiction, publishing his first stories in Black Mask. Chandler's detective stories often starred the brash but honorable Philip Marlowe (introduced in 1939 in his first novel, The Big Sleep) and were noted for their literate presentation and dead-on critical eye. Never a prolific writer, Chandler published only one collection of stories and seven novels in his lifetime. Some of Chandler's novels, like The Big Sleep, were made into classic movies which helped define the film noir style. In the last year of his life he was elected president of the Mystery Writers of America. He died in La Jolla, California on March 26, 1959.