The Big Sleep

First published in 1939, this detective novel follows Los Angeles private investigator Philip Marlowe after the dying General Sternwood hires him to stop a blackmailer preying on the younger daughter, Carmen. The case opens onto a pornography racket, a missing son-in-law, and the older daughter Vivian, who is entangled with the gambler Eddie Mars. Marlowe moves through oil fields, empty houses, and rain-soaked Hollywood streets, dealing with killers who work for more than one employer. The plot is a sequence of concealments rather than a single locked-room puzzle. The book is hard-boiled crime fiction, not a police procedural.

8 illustrations. Black slipcase.