In the third Philip Marlowe book, a bilious, dipsomaniac widow hires the
sleuth to track down a very rare and valuable coin, which she believes
has been stolen by her estranged daughter-in-law. He soon finds out that
the job includes being accosted by the woman's ineffectual son, who
still loves his wife, and by her timorous, neurotic secretary, for their
own reasons. There's even another detective on the case, a cheerful but
clumsy fellow, and two murders later Marlowe is checking in with the
criminal classes to see what they have to say. He gets along with them
better than he does the widow.
This is an astonishing feat of
writing. These books aren't whodunits in the traditional sense; they
aren't even noir, really. Marlowe is a genre unto itself, with original
and self-assured writing that constructs a labyrinthine plot, but isn't
really about the plot at all. A man confesses to a murder he didn't
commit; later he'll recant and the murder will go cold and unsolved.
Marlowe helps a lady in distress as far as he can. He also maybe helps
another fellow get away with murder. Maybe the victim deserved it. Who's
to say? Not Marlowe. "The white moonlight was cold and clear, like the
justice we dream of but don't find."
five stars
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