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Dashiell Hammett Collection
Contains the following short stories:
Afraid of A Gun,
Arson Plus,
Bodies Piled Up,
Death On Pine Street,
Man Who Killed Dan Odams,
Mike Alec Or Rufus,
Nightmare Town,
Night Shots,
One Hour,
Road Home,
Ruffian's Wife,
Second Story Angel,
The Assistant Murderer,
The Tenth Clew,
Who Killed Bob Teal,
Zigzags of Treachery.
Afraid of A Gun,
Arson Plus,
Bodies Piled Up,
Death On Pine Street,
Man Who Killed Dan Odams,
Mike Alec Or Rufus,
Nightmare Town,
Night Shots,
One Hour,
Road Home,
Ruffian's Wife,
Second Story Angel,
The Assistant Murderer,
The Tenth Clew,
Who Killed Bob Teal,
Zigzags of Treachery.
- GenresShort StoriesCrime
313 pages, ebook
First published August 28, 2010
2 people are currently reading
38 people want to read
About the author
Dashiell Hammett
602 books2,854 followersAlso wrote as Peter Collinson, Daghull Hammett, Samuel Dashiell, Mary Jane Hammett
Dashiell Hammett, an American, wrote highly acclaimed detective fiction, including The Maltese Falcon (1930) and The Thin Man (1934).
Samuel Dashiell Hammett authored hardboiled novels and short stories. He created Sam Spade (The Maltese Falcon), Nick and Nora Charles (The Thin Man), and the Continental Op (Red Harvest and The Dain Curse) among the enduring characters. In addition to the significant influence his novels and stories had on film, Hammett "is now widely regarded as one of the finest mystery writers of all time" and was called, in his obituary in the New York Times, "the dean of the... 'hard-boiled' school of detective fiction."
See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dashiell...
Dashiell Hammett, an American, wrote highly acclaimed detective fiction, including The Maltese Falcon (1930) and The Thin Man (1934).
Samuel Dashiell Hammett authored hardboiled novels and short stories. He created Sam Spade (The Maltese Falcon), Nick and Nora Charles (The Thin Man), and the Continental Op (Red Harvest and The Dain Curse) among the enduring characters. In addition to the significant influence his novels and stories had on film, Hammett "is now widely regarded as one of the finest mystery writers of all time" and was called, in his obituary in the New York Times, "the dean of the... 'hard-boiled' school of detective fiction."
See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dashiell...
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
November 3, 2012
Dirty deeds writ clean. He makes it look so easy. A collection of short stories and a couple of novellas (Nightmare Town was, I think, later rewritten as the full-length novel Red Harvest - which has a whole fascinating back history of being the basis for at least half a dozen films with different titles.) All satisfying and gritty and spare of word. This is available on Amazon for Kindle for $.99.
Quotes:
The man stood for a time where he had halted - just within the door to one side - a grotesque statue modelled of mud. Short, sturdy-bodied, with massive sagging shoulders. Nothing of clothing or hair showed through his husk of clay, and little of face and hands. The marshal’s revolver in his hand, clean and dry, took on by virtue of that discordant immaculateness an exaggerated deadliness.
...she was madder than you’d think anybody could get on short notice.
She didn’t have any words I hadn’t heard before, but she fitted them together in combinations that were new to me.
The girl looked at the place where he stood as if no one stood there, as if, in fact, no one had ever stood there, turned her small back on him, and walked very precisely down the street.
Why, he wondered, whenever there was some special reason for gravity, did he always find himself becoming flippant?
She made proud sentences for herself while she spoke other sentences, or listened to them.
Margaret’s throat had some swollen thing in it. Fog blurred everything but the charging red face. An unvoiced whimper shook her breast. She wanted to run to him as to a lover. She wanted to run from him as from a ravisher. She stood very still in her doorway, smiling demurely with dry, hot mouth.
After all, if a man says a thing often enough, he is very likely to acquire some sort of faith in it sooner or later.
I don’t like eloquence: if it isn’t effective enough to pierce your hide, it’s tiresome; and if it is effective enough, then it muddles your thoughts.
Quotes:
The man stood for a time where he had halted - just within the door to one side - a grotesque statue modelled of mud. Short, sturdy-bodied, with massive sagging shoulders. Nothing of clothing or hair showed through his husk of clay, and little of face and hands. The marshal’s revolver in his hand, clean and dry, took on by virtue of that discordant immaculateness an exaggerated deadliness.
...she was madder than you’d think anybody could get on short notice.
She didn’t have any words I hadn’t heard before, but she fitted them together in combinations that were new to me.
The girl looked at the place where he stood as if no one stood there, as if, in fact, no one had ever stood there, turned her small back on him, and walked very precisely down the street.
Why, he wondered, whenever there was some special reason for gravity, did he always find himself becoming flippant?
She made proud sentences for herself while she spoke other sentences, or listened to them.
Margaret’s throat had some swollen thing in it. Fog blurred everything but the charging red face. An unvoiced whimper shook her breast. She wanted to run to him as to a lover. She wanted to run from him as from a ravisher. She stood very still in her doorway, smiling demurely with dry, hot mouth.
After all, if a man says a thing often enough, he is very likely to acquire some sort of faith in it sooner or later.
I don’t like eloquence: if it isn’t effective enough to pierce your hide, it’s tiresome; and if it is effective enough, then it muddles your thoughts.
May 25, 2012
I have been so busy lately that it took becoming sick for me to finish this book. Grrrr. So much for my reaching my number of books goal this year.
This is a collection of short stories mainly involving Hammett's unnamed detective character who works for the Continental Detective agency. This is a cute gimmick and it was interesting to see how Hammett goes about revealing so little about his point-of-view character while describing the other characters in the stories so well.
Hammett's work was recommended to me as an example of the hard-bitten detective fiction genre which I might like to incorporate into my own Changeling Detective stories (excuse the plug). However, there is a huge distance between the society and technology of the 1920s and 30s and today's contemporary scene. For example, many of Hammett's stories have the private detective working hand-in-hand with the city's police detectives and quite often taking the lead in an investigation, something that I can't see happening these days.
What might be of more use is his representation of criminals. In a world which I thought was more black and white than today he assembled quite and interesting collection of crooks, swindlers and opportunists that were looking to make a fast buck with the least effort and danger. This I think is an important point. Most of the violence that occurs in this book follow on from some get-rich scheme that goes pear-shaped leaving the criminal desperately trying to cover their tracks by silencing potential witnesses or double-crossing associates. The criminals are not out to do violence for its own sake, it is purely a means to an end.
I was less than impressed with the quality of the production of this eBook. It was obviously OCRed from a hard copy original and contained many silly typos that a spell checker would have picked up easily. It was obvious to me that no one read the stories after they had been scanned.
An interesting look at the history of crime fiction and best recommended for those interested in such.
This is a collection of short stories mainly involving Hammett's unnamed detective character who works for the Continental Detective agency. This is a cute gimmick and it was interesting to see how Hammett goes about revealing so little about his point-of-view character while describing the other characters in the stories so well.
Hammett's work was recommended to me as an example of the hard-bitten detective fiction genre which I might like to incorporate into my own Changeling Detective stories (excuse the plug). However, there is a huge distance between the society and technology of the 1920s and 30s and today's contemporary scene. For example, many of Hammett's stories have the private detective working hand-in-hand with the city's police detectives and quite often taking the lead in an investigation, something that I can't see happening these days.
What might be of more use is his representation of criminals. In a world which I thought was more black and white than today he assembled quite and interesting collection of crooks, swindlers and opportunists that were looking to make a fast buck with the least effort and danger. This I think is an important point. Most of the violence that occurs in this book follow on from some get-rich scheme that goes pear-shaped leaving the criminal desperately trying to cover their tracks by silencing potential witnesses or double-crossing associates. The criminals are not out to do violence for its own sake, it is purely a means to an end.
I was less than impressed with the quality of the production of this eBook. It was obviously OCRed from a hard copy original and contained many silly typos that a spell checker would have picked up easily. It was obvious to me that no one read the stories after they had been scanned.
An interesting look at the history of crime fiction and best recommended for those interested in such.
May 24, 2015
Stories starring Hammett's unnamed private detective, working for the Continental Detective Agency, a stand-in for Hammett"s own employer, the legendary Pinkerton Detective Agency. Hammett's Continental Op is brilliantly short and fat, so extra-curricular romance will not be expected to be a major factor, allowing the stories to focus on the work. "Nightmare Town" is a standout story of over-the-top violence and corruption. The iconic "lady-killing" Sam Spade character and other memorable characters, like Gutman, will come later, in the wonderful The Maltese Falcon.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews