Goodreads helps you keep track of books you want to read.

Start by marking “The Maltese Falcon” as Want to Read:

Other editions

Enlarge cover

Rate this book

Clear rating

1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars

Open Preview

The Maltese Falcon

Dashiell Hammett

3.92 · Rating details · 72,051 Ratings · 3,899 Reviews

Sam Spade is hired by the fragrant Miss Wonderley to track down her sister, who has eloped with a louse called Floyd Thursby. But Miss Wonderley is in fact the beautiful and treacherous Brigid O'Shaughnessy, and when Spade's partner Miles Archer is shot while on Thursby's trail, Spade finds himself both hunter and hunted: can he track down the jewel-encrusted bird, a treas ...more

Get A Copy

Or buy for

Paperback, 213 pages

Published March 1st 2005 by Orion (first published 1930)

More Details... edit details

Friend Reviews

To see what your friends thought of this book, please sign up.

Reader Q&A

To ask other readers questions about The Maltese Falcon, please sign up.

Lists with This Book

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson

And Then There Were None by Agatha Christie

Best Crime & Mystery Books

5,140 books — 12,688 voters

The Postman Always Rings Twice by James M. Cain

Best Hardboiled PI & Noir

618 books — 731 voters

More lists with this book...

Community Reviews

(showing 1-30)

Rating details

Sort: Default

Filter

May 15, 2011 Stephen rated it it was amazing

Shelves: crime, hardboiled-and-noir, mystery, audiobook, ebooks, kings-of-badassia, 1930-1953

Look out folks…here comes GREATNESS…

“When you’re slapped, you’ll take it and like it”
[image error]
GIFSoup

Sam Spade (played by the legendary Humphrey Bogart) bitch-slapping the manhood out of Joel Cairo (played by Peter Lorre)….and telling him to shut up and take it!! Do I really need to continue the review after that? That is perfection. However, for those tough sells I will continue with my “Why is this book Awesome” thesis.

First, this story IS NOIR. Now there are a lot of wonderful noirs ou ...more

flag 157 likes · Like · see review

Feb 04, 2017 Brina rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: classics, mystery

Born in 1894 and serving as a sergeant in World War I, Dashiell Hammett used his experiences to become one of the premier detective writers of the first half of the twentieth century. Set in Depression Era San Francisco and introducing the world to Samuel Spade, Hammett's The Maltese Falcon became a detective story that many in the genre still try to measure up to today. A classic that helped change the way writers told detective stories, The Maltese Falcon is a classic case that contains all th Born in 1894 and serving as a sergeant in World War I, Dashiell Hammett used his experiences to become one of the premier detective writers of the first half of the twentieth century. Set in Depression Era San Francisco and introducing the world to Samuel Spade, Hammett's The Maltese Falcon became a detective story that many in the genre still try to measure up to today. A classic that helped change the way writers told detective stories, The Maltese Falcon is a classic case that contains all the elements of a fun whodunit.

Drawing inspiration from his own life, Hammett created Samuel Spade, a private eye detective who saw action in Europe in World War I. At the opening of this book, Spade has taken on the services of a new client, one Miss Bridget O'Shaughnessy, who requests protection from thugs who have tailed her around the globe. Along with the assistance of his partner Miles Archer, Spade takes the case; however, Archer is quickly gunned down by one of the aforementioned thugs, and the case spirals into action. Spade is forced to work alone with only bit help from his secretary Effie Perrine and a classic whodunit ensues.

We find out that Spade has contacts all over San Francisco from his work as a private eye detective. The police do not desire that a private detective encroaches on their work, and the chief as well as the district attorney are out to get him for Archer's murder, as far fetched as that sounds. Underneath the murder and thugs is the root of the case- a Maltese Falcon figurine estimated to be worth a million dollars. In the depression era this was a large fortune, and O'Shaughnessy hopes that Spade helps her procure the Falcon and deliver both her and it to safety before the thugs find them.

As this is detective noir, O'Shaughnessy goes from client to lover and good to bad. Each thug has at least one gun or pistol, and more goons seem to be hanging around each corner, all as far fetched in character as the next: Gutman, the fat man and only one with brains in the group; Cairo, the apparent boy loving Levantine; and Wilmer, Gutman's hired kid and fall guy. Each attempts to force Spade into a corner, which of course, he eventually gets his way out of.

The Maltese Falcon is a classic detective noir story and fun whodunit. A depression era story where everyone wore a trench coat and hat and rolled their own cigarettes, it is also a holdover from the 1920s gangster era, which is becoming one of my favorite eras to read about. A pulp noir story that became a movie starring Humphrey Bogart, The Maltese Falcon is a classic detective tale in a genre that I am quickly starting to enjoy. I rate The Maltese Falcon 4.5 and look forward to reading more of Dashiell Hammett's detective cases. ...more

flag 122 likes · Like · see review

Jul 14, 2008 Dan Schwent rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: pulp, 2012, crime-and-mystery

2012 re-read...
Sam Spade's partner is murdered and Sam is determined to find his killer. But what does Miles Archer's murder have to do with the client he was working for or the mysterious Maltese Falcon?

What can I say about one of the Big Two pulp detective novels, the other being The Big Sleep? Well, let's see...

The Maltese Falcon embodies a lot of what made pulp detective fiction great, leading to hordes of imitators. You've got the wise-cracking detective who has a way with the ladies, gunpl 2012 re-read...
Sam Spade's partner is murdered and Sam is determined to find his killer. But what does Miles Archer's murder have to do with the client he was working for or the mysterious Maltese Falcon?

What can I say about one of the Big Two pulp detective novels, the other being The Big Sleep? Well, let's see...

The Maltese Falcon embodies a lot of what made pulp detective fiction great, leading to hordes of imitators. You've got the wise-cracking detective who has a way with the ladies, gunplay, deceit, sex, and murder. Throw in an elusive macguffin and you have a blueprint a lot of writers have been following for over three quarters of a century.

Sam Spade, that blonde Satan, is the father of many detectives that came him. In fact, it would be interesting to see whether he or Raymond Chandler has more bastard detective descendents. The plot the Maltese Falcon is fairly simple. Somebody has the Maltese Falcon and everyone seems to think Sam Spade knows where it is. Miles Archer's murder complicates things a bit but really isn't much more than a bump in the road until his killer is revealed.

The bad guys and supporting cast are an interesting bunch. Brigid O'Shaughnessy lays the groundwork for a lot of femme fatales to come. Gutman, Cairo, and Wilmer are more than just stock characters. The cops were a little light on personality but they were mostly in the story to hassle Spade so that's not such of a big deal.

Hammett's prose drives the plot along but lacks the poetry of Raymond Chandler's. Seventeen years after I read The Maltese Falcon for the first time, I have more of an appreciation for Hammett's spare style. The plot keeps moving forward without a single misstep. It's only 200-ish pages but by the end, it feels like the perfect length for such a tale.

Any complaints? Not as such. Modern readers will probably not like the book's treatment of women but it was written in the late 1920's so it has to be given a bit of slack. Honestly, my only complaints are that there aren't any more Sam Spade books and that Dashielle Hammett wasn't Raymond Chandler.

For a parting thought, this line of dialogue nicely sums up Sam Spade's character:
"When a man's partner is killed he's supposed to do something about it. It doesn't make any difference what you thought of him." ...more

flag 93 likes · Like · see review

Aug 04, 2014 Sanjay Gautam rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Everything seemed separated for the first sixty pages, with no connection whatsoever. But the story was full of suspense and unfolded with many surprises after that. The plot was very captivating, and seemed very realistic. The main thread is 'Maltese Falcon' (I'm not going to tell you what it is, as it would be a spoiler and I hate to give spoilers) around which everything revolves. Its a good read and keeps you guessing till the last.

Highly recommend!

flag 93 likes · Like · see review

Mar 20, 2016 Glenn Russell rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Recommended to Glenn by: .

My top ten reasons why this Dashiell Hammett is one of the greatest crime novels ever written:

1. The Voice – Tough, Crisp hardboiled – the story isn’t told in first-person but certainly has the feel of first-person since we are so close to Sam Spade it’s as if we’re peering over the detective’s shoulder from first to last page.

2. The City – The buildings and streets in San Francisco have such a tangible presence, even today, after nearly 100 years, they still give Maltese Falcon tours.

3. Femme Fatale – Brigid O’Shaughnessy is the femme fatale. Her looks, her way of speaking, her cunning, her charms, her allurement– legions of writers of detective fiction have changed her name, her home town, color of her hair and eyes, but all you have to do is scratch the surface and there she is.

4. Outside the Law – Nobody likes a cog in the legal wheel or a grey flannel flunkey following orders. Sam Spade is anything but – an outsider to the police, district attorney and even his clients, Sammy is his own man, cracking the case in his own way, in his own time and even willing to get socked in the jaw by a police lieutenant or pulled in by a high ranking official to make it happen.

5. Tone – Sharp and crisp. If you read (and look) carefully, an entire world is disclosed, as for example: “Spade emptied the unconscious man’s pockets one by one, working methodically, moving the lax body when necessary, making a pile of the pockets’ contents on the desk. When the last pocket had been turned out he returned to his own chair, rolled and lighted a cigarette, and began to examine his spoils. He examined them with grave unhurried thoroughness.”

6. Violence – Nothing juices the action in a detective fiction more than cold bloody murder. An entire string of murders are featured here, all happening at the right time to accelerate tempo. Also, there’s a good amount of roughhouse, with the least likely man in the novel, Joel Cairo, getting beat up every time he turns around. Serves him right for thinking himself so refined and above it all.

7. The Color of Character – Dashiell Hammett set the gold standard here for writers of detective fiction. “The fat man was flabbily fat with bulbous pink cheeks and lips and chins and neck, with a great soft egg of a belly that was all his torso, and pendant cones for arms and legs. As he advanced to meet Spade all his bulbs rose and shook and fell separately with such step, in the manner of clustered soap-bubbles not yet released from the pipe through which they had been blown. His eyes, made small by fat puffs around them, where dark and sleek. Dark ringlets thinly covered his broad scalp. He wore a back cutaway coat, black vest, black satin Ascot tie holding a pinkish pearl, striped grey worsted trousers, and patent-leather shoes. His voice was a throaty purr.”

8. The Moral Code – As one character finds out the hard way, Sam Spade is a man of the high, uncompromising character. You will have to read the novel to find out just how high and just how uncompromising.

9. The Whole is Greater than the Parts – The Maltese Falcon has that special something that separates it from other crime fiction, even crime fiction of the first order. What is it? Hard to put your finger on it, but as millions of readers have discovered every time they pick it up, this is one doozy of a classic.

10, The Dingus – Ah, yes, the object of obsessive desire, the bird with all those long-lost jewels. Has there ever been a famous actor more closely connected with a famous object? And, yes, in many ways, the much sought after black bird adds a unique aesthetic dimension to this tale of noir.
++

...more

flag 133 likes · Like · see review

Jan 07, 2012 James rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: 1-fiction

Book Review
4 out of 5 stars to The Maltese Falcon, a classic mystery novel written in 1930 by Dashiell Hammett. If you ask a mystery fan when the genre started, a good chunk of them will say during the Golden Age (1920s & 30s) with authors like Dashiell Hammett, specifically with the creation of the Sam Spade character. Immediately what comes to mind is the old-fashioned black-and-white movies with the coat and hat on the detective, the accents and the chase scenes. While these are all t Book Review
4 out of 5 stars to The Maltese Falcon, a classic mystery novel written in 1930 by Dashiell Hammett. If you ask a mystery fan when the genre started, a good chunk of them will say during the Golden Age (1920s & 30s) with authors like Dashiell Hammett, specifically with the creation of the Sam Spade character. Immediately what comes to mind is the old-fashioned black-and-white movies with the coat and hat on the detective, the accents and the chase scenes. While these are all true, few have actually read these novels. I've been a fan of mystery since I was a young kid, reading a bunch in my teenage years. I re-read a lot during an independent study course I design while getting my English degree while in college. This book was one of the first the Dean and my professor recommended to me. I had read parts of it and seen the movies made from it, but I wasn't as familiar with the whole Golden Age. But once you read this book, you thirst for more. It's so well-written (apart from some of the ideas that have positively changed since then, e.g. racial or gender bias) from a mystery perspective, you are immediately engaged. And one of the sub-plots in these types of books are often "will he get the girl" or "is the girl on his side of the bad guy's side?" In The Maltese Falcon, you get it all. It's international. It's romantic. It's dangerous. It's scary. It's complex. And it ends in a very unexpected kinda way. It's a game-changer for the genre and that's why it's called the Golden Age. For mystery fans, you better have read this one. For non-mystery fans, it's a good story, and if you like older books, them you should give it a chance.

About Me
For those new to me or my reviews... here's the scoop: I read A LOT. I write A LOT. And now I blog A LOT. First the book review goes on Goodreads, and then I send it on over to my WordPress blog at https://thisismytruthnow.com, where you'll also find TV & Film reviews, the revealing and introspective 365 Daily Challenge and lots of blogging about places I've visited all over the world. And you can find all my social media profiles to get the details on the who/what/when/where and my pictures. Leave a comment and let me know what you think. Vote in the poll and ratings. Thanks for stopping by. ...more

flag 66 likes · Like · see review

Jan 07, 2009 Werner rated it it was ok

Shelves: mystery-crime-fiction

C. S. Lewis once observed that you shouldn't review individual books or stories of a general type that you dislike, because your basic distaste for the genre is apt to blind you to the relative merits of how well the author handles the individual features of his/her work, and how it stacks up against other works of the same sort. When it comes to the whole noir school of detective fiction, that's probably advice I should heed; based both on the little of it that I've read and what I've read abou C. S. Lewis once observed that you shouldn't review individual books or stories of a general type that you dislike, because your basic distaste for the genre is apt to blind you to the relative merits of how well the author handles the individual features of his/her work, and how it stacks up against other works of the same sort. When it comes to the whole noir school of detective fiction, that's probably advice I should heed; based both on the little of it that I've read and what I've read about it, it's not my cup of tea. The problem for me isn't the dark subject matter: my literary tastes run to the Romantic school, with its appeal to emotion, and the perils and adventures associated with urban vice and crime in sinister settings can be potentially rife with appeal to various emotions. Rather, my negative reaction is to the moral orientation (or lack of it); the noir vision is typically amoral and cynical, convinced that virtue is virtually nonexistent and doomed to defeat if it does exist, and larded with an industrial-strength existential pessimism guaranteed to thoroughly depress most any reader. Related to this is the fact that while the traditional mystery genre sees crime as an aberration of the order of things, which can be detected and set straight by the application of reason, noir views crime as the norm and denies that reason and logic can do much with it. So, noir detectives don't do much traditional detecting.

To try to give Hammett his due within this subgenre, though, this is a well-done example of the school; its classic status is no accident. Sam Spade and the other characters are archetypes, not yet degenerated into stereotypes by the flood of imitations that would follow; Spade's likability factor is about nil (like all detectives of this stamp, he's often obnoxious, awash in chip-on-the-shoulder bad attitude), but you don't readily forget him, or Brigit O'Shaughnessy, Casper Guttman, or Joel Cairo. I read this novel forty years ago (it was included in a mystery anthology, the title of which I don't remember, made up otherwise of short stories); the fact that I can remember it very well after all this time says something about the vividness and force of the writing. And the solution to the murder of Spade's partner is one that does call for genuine deduction on his part, and is one I didn't see coming --though I might have if I'd been more familiar with the noir conventions. (It isn't as surprising as Christie's solution in The Murder of Roger Ackroyd --but it comes close.) A valid criticism might be that the San Francisco setting isn't really evoked very strongly --beyond a few place names and isolated details, the locale could be the mean streets of any city of that day. But Hammett's interest didn't lie in regional realism or a sense of place.

Later examples of noir acquired a reputation for milking sex and violence for all the titillation it was worth, but Hammett avoids explicit sex (though he makes it clear that some illicit sex went on at one point) or gratuitous directly-described violence. Likewise, the bad language is well within the bounds of respectable realism for the characters and situations. ...more

flag 64 likes · Like · see review

May 15, 2016 John Culuris rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: favorites, top-shelf, 5-star

I once read the following in some TV guide regarding the classic movie adaptation: “The 1941 mystery is the yardstick against which all private-eye films are measured.” It is even more true of the novel. Never before (or since) has a protagonist been forced to look so deeply within himself, to have to explain who he is to so many while not completely understanding why he is that way himself. Sam Spade knows what he has to do, and externally he knows why he has to do it. He acts assuredly, withou ...more

flag 64 likes · Like · see review

Aug 09, 2012 Evgeny rated it really liked it

Shelves: crime-and-mystery

Welcome to Spade and Archer detective agency. One day a gorgeous woman came in asking to help tracking her sister who ran away with a bad guy. The down payment was good, so the detectives took the case, no questions asked. As the direct result one of the detectives - Sam Spade - got to experience all of the traditional noir fun while readers follow ever-twisting plot.

noir dog

I said it countless times before and I will say it again: Sam Spade is the grandfather of all PIs in all noir, in particular all ...more

flag 56 likes · Like · see review

Sep 26, 2017 Robin rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: audio-book, noir, mystery, 2017, american

"I don't mind a reasonable amount of trouble.”

I haven't seen the famous movie version of this book starring a young, dreamy Humphrey Bogart, but now I sure want to.

This 1930's noir beauty set the template for hard-boiled detective stories, paving the way for other writers like Raymond Chandler and James M. Cain.

The action begins when our hero Sam Spade, finds out his partner, Phil Archer is found shot while on a job. The story has all you could ask for: a tough, smart private eye, a gorgeous fe ...more

flag 50 likes · Like · see review

Apr 11, 2013 Jason Koivu rated it it was amazing

You got nothin' on this book, see?! Yeah! That's right, skedaddle and quick-like!

Private detective Sam Spade smells trouble when a crazy dame walks into his office, and sure enough, his life is soon turned topsy turvy. Spade gets all tangled up in a fishy double murder. The coppers are on him, he's on to the dame and people keep popping outta the woodwork goin' on and on about this g. d. bird! If things keep up like this somebody's gonna get themselves killed dead.

Since the book's publication, t ...more

flag 49 likes · Like · see review

Apr 16, 2016 Lyn rated it really liked it

Dashiell Hammett’s The Maltese Falcon introduces the world to Sam Spade and established a benchmark upon which a genre – the hard-boiled crime novel – was popularized.

Of his character, Hammett says:

“Spade has no original. He is a dream man in the sense that he is what most of the private detectives I worked with would like to have been and in their cockier moments thought they approached. For your private detective does not — or did not ten years ago when he was my colleague — want to be an eru ...more

flag 66 likes · Like · see review

Jan 04, 2015 kohey rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

It's my BIBLE.

flag 37 likes · Like · see review

Mar 24, 2015 Forrest rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Call me an uncultured Cretin (it's true), but I've never seen the movie, so I have nothing to compare it to but the only other classic noir book I've ever read (told you I was a Cretin), Raymond Chandler's The Big Sleep. Where Chandler's prose sets a baseline from which he can occasionally spring a trick in the form of a clever turn of phrase, Hammett's prose is as straightforward as it gets, which I saw as a minus. That said, the blandness of the language lets the reader concentrate on plot and Call me an uncultured Cretin (it's true), but I've never seen the movie, so I have nothing to compare it to but the only other classic noir book I've ever read (told you I was a Cretin), Raymond Chandler's The Big Sleep. Where Chandler's prose sets a baseline from which he can occasionally spring a trick in the form of a clever turn of phrase, Hammett's prose is as straightforward as it gets, which I saw as a minus. That said, the blandness of the language lets the reader concentrate on plot and characterization, where Hammett shines a touch more than Chandler. Unlike the overly-convoluted un-plot of The Big Sleep, which Chandler admits he just sort of made up as he went along and never fully understood himself, Hammett unravels a mystery, the details of which are made very clear by the end of the book. That's not to say that it's transparent, by any means. Sam Spade, the protagonist, is perpetually surrounded by liars and he's a pretty good fabricator of truths, or at least a master at twisting the truth, himself. There are plenty of surprises in store for the reader unfamiliar with the story (i.e., one who hasn't seen the movie yet - shame on you for peeking ahead!), and the reveals at the end are rewarding enough. Part of the reason for this is that Spade, while staying true to his inner self, is a great wearer of masks. His unexpected actions, which several other characters remark upon, might actually be coldly-calculated, rather than merely whimsical. And though one must question whether Spade is a good guy or a bad guy, throughout, in the end we see that he simultaneously remains true to himself while revealing his true underlying morality. Hammett shows a deft hand in presenting all of the villainous, bungling supporting cast, but shows the master-stroke in hiding the real Sam Spade until the end of the novel, where Spade's strong sense of ethics is unveiled to the reader. Perhaps this is why I found him a more fascinating, deeper character than Chandler's Philip Marlowe (whom I admired, actually).

All told, though, I'm glad I read both.

And there will be more noir in my future. That's no mystery. ...more

flag 35 likes · Like · see review

May 16, 2018 Glenn Sumi rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: 1900-1960, classics, guardian-1000, modern-library-100

Quick: Can you remember the plot of The Maltese Falcon?

I read it a couple of weeks ago, and I’ve seen the classic 1941 film noir at least twice. But even I’m hazy on the fine details of the story.

In late 1920s San Francisco, a bunch of people want the priceless titular statue, and will do anything – bribe, steal, frame, kill, and lie their faces off – to get their claws on it.

It’s up to detective Sam Spade to keep various parties in the dark about what the others know. There’s the mysterious wo ...more

flag 32 likes · Like · see review

May 24, 2016 Duane rated it really liked it

Shelves: 2016-book-challenge, rated-books, guardian-1000, biographies, american-classics, mystery-crime, reviewed-books

This novel is set in 1920's San Francisco and creates the character of Sam Spade, a name now synonymous with crime detective fiction. And Modern Library ranks The Maltese Falcon in it's 100 best novels of the 20th century. One of the remarkable things about the novel is that it's not dated at all. The setting could be 1980 as well as 1929. The cast is small and well defined, and the plot is straight-forward, not complicated. And with Hammett's ability to add exquisite detail, the end result is a ...more

flag 36 likes · Like · see review

Jul 02, 2008 Kemper rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: crime-mystery, detectives, classic-lit, favorites, 2012-reread

This book is pretty good. Too bad it’s not better known. And it’d be cool if somebody made a decent movie version of it someday...

flag 31 likes · Like · see review

May 01, 2013 Apatt rated it really liked it

Anybody who read this book without any prior knowledge of it would probably dismiss it as being full of cliches, archetypes and tropes, they would be dead wrong of course because this is where these tropes originated. The anti-hero, smooth talking P.I., the femme fatale, the plucky Girl Friday secretary, the gay gangster (uh, I'm not sure if this actually caught on) etc.

I don't actually have a lot to say about this book because, while it was moderately enjoyable, it did not do anything above and ...more

flag 29 likes · Like · see review

Mar 16, 2014 Gregor Xane rated it it was ok · review of another edition

Shelves: 2014

The writing in Hammett's Maltese Falcon seemed to get more fluid as it went along. It started out stilted and choppy. I also wasn't particularly keen on his predilection for cataloging every single item of clothing every character was wearing. Another thing that I found strange was his choice to describe in user-manual detail exactly how, step-by-step, Sam Spade rolls a cigarette. This happened early in the book and killed the forward movement of the narrative for me.

But I read on because I foun ...more

flag 28 likes · Like · see review

May 31, 2015 Matthew rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: 2015, audio, library, mystery, classic

Story wise - just so-so for me. It is supposed to be a classic, so I expected more from the story.

But, if you are looking for all the stereotypical hard-boiled detective stuff (dames and all that) this book definitely delivers.

flag 29 likes · Like · see review

May 17, 2012 Brandon rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: detective-books, fiction, favorites, noir, 2012

Here we go. Book number two in my 25 crime-fiction classic list! After finishing this, I probably should've started with this one but honestly, who's going to blame me for reading a Raymond Chandler novel first?

Sam Spade and Miles Archer, private eyes residing in San Fransisco, are hired by a woman to procure the safe return of her little sister after she has run off with another man. While Spade accepts the job, he doesn't completely buy Ms. Wonderly's story feeling that there is more to what s Here we go. Book number two in my 25 crime-fiction classic list! After finishing this, I probably should've started with this one but honestly, who's going to blame me for reading a Raymond Chandler novel first?

Sam Spade and Miles Archer, private eyes residing in San Fransisco, are hired by a woman to procure the safe return of her little sister after she has run off with another man. While Spade accepts the job, he doesn't completely buy Ms. Wonderly's story feeling that there is more to what she's telling them. What turns out to be the understatement to end all understatement's, Spade becomes entangled in a search for a rare, valuable statue that puts his life in danger and his reputation with the law on the line.

I was originally hesitant about starting this noir/hard boiled/crime fiction journey because I was under the impression that these books were going to suffer from such massive over-hype that I would feel RIDICULOUS for not liking them.

This book was just tremendous. Really, just all around greatness from start to finish. It blows my mind that there had not been many books around at the time written in this style or with characters like these. It must have had people reeling when they finished it, scrambling for more!

Like Chandler's The Big Sleep, this book is endlessly quotable. I'm such a fan of great similes and snappy, witty dialogue and this book is just stuffed to the breaking point with memorable lines.

If it hadn't been so damn entertaining, I may have taken a little bit of an issue that Spade never really seems to be in any danger. Despite the fact that these criminals have the upper hand on a few occasions, they come across as buffoons with no real plans of their own.

That being said, it's hard to really find fault in something so excellent.

On a side note, something tells me that if I slap someone and they get angry, I wouldn't be able to tell them they'll take it AND like it. It works for Spade because he's clearly so damn slick but I doubt I have the ability to pull that one off. ...more

flag 25 likes · Like · see review

Feb 27, 2018 Stacey rated it liked it

My expectations of The Maltese Falcon were too high. I love a good hard boiled crime story with a stereotypical detective and a bad girl. Brigid O’Shaughnessy you are a very bad girl. This was a good detective story and the writing was great, but ultimately I felt deflated. I haven't seen the movie so maybe I'll check it out.

flag 25 likes · Like · see review

Nov 20, 2011 Richard Derus rated it really liked it

Book Circle Reads 36

Rating: 3.5* of five, because I love the movie more

The Publisher Says: Sam Spade, Dashiell Hammett's archetypally tough San Francisco detective, is more noir than L.A. Confidential and more vulnerable than Raymond Chandler's Marlowe. In The Maltese Falcon, the best known of Hammett's Sam Spade novels (including The Dain Curse and The Glass Key), Spade is tough enough to bluff the toughest thugs and hold off the police, risking his reputation when a beautiful woman begs for h ...more

flag 24 likes · Like · see review

Sep 03, 2010 Madeline rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: the-list, assigned-reading, detective-fiction

So, a dame walks into a private detective's office...stop me if you've heard this one before.

Let's be honest, you probably have. But luckily this is no ordinary dame. And the office belongs to no ordinary detective. They are Miss Wonderly (not her only name, by the way) and Sam Spade, the mold by which all hard-boiled fast-talking slang-laden detective stories are made. The Maltese Falcon chronicles their shared adventures chasing a valuable, bejeweled falcon statuette that's been stolen and br So, a dame walks into a private detective's office...stop me if you've heard this one before.

Let's be honest, you probably have. But luckily this is no ordinary dame. And the office belongs to no ordinary detective. They are Miss Wonderly (not her only name, by the way) and Sam Spade, the mold by which all hard-boiled fast-talking slang-laden detective stories are made. The Maltese Falcon chronicles their shared adventures chasing a valuable, bejeweled falcon statuette that's been stolen and brought to San Francisco. There are fistfights, gunfights, slapping fights, lots of well-dressed men trading banter while well-dressed women watch, people get murdered, the police blunder around, everybody drinks a lot, and it's fucking awesome. Along with his talent for writing dialogue and action scenes, Dashiell Hammett also has a gift for physical description, as seen here:

"She was tall and pliantly slender, without angularity anywhere. Her body was erect and high-breasted, her legs long, her hands and feet narrow. She wore two shades of blue that had been chosen because of her eyes. The hair curling from under her blue hat was darkly red, her full lips more brightly red. White teeth glistened in the crescent her timid smile made."

and here:

"The fat man was flabbily fat with bulbous pink cheeks and lips and chins and neck, with a great soft egg of a belly that was all his torso, and pendant cones for arms and legs. As he advanced to meet Spade all his bulbs rose and shook and fell separately with each step, in the manner of clustered soap bubbles not yet released from the pipe through which they had been blown. His eyes, made small by fat puffs around them, were dark and sleek. Dark ringlets thinly covered his broad scalp. He wore a black cutaway coat, black vest, black sating Ascot tie holding a pinkish pearl, striped grey worsted trousers, and patent-leather shoes."

The best part of all of this, really, is that a book that's full of all the awesome stuff I've described above is on the list of 1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die. So, take that George Elliot.

Read for: Social Forces in the Detective Novel

...more

flag 22 likes · Like · see review

Jul 23, 2016 Jan Philipzig rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: addiction-obsession, adventure, crime, drugs-alcohol, gender, mystery, noir, pulpy, romance, surveillance

Classic hard-boiled detective story from 1929 that feels both cool and passionate, ruthless and righteous, slick and defiant, charming and stubborn, resourceful and gloomy. Here are a few quotes:

--Samuel Spade's jaw was long and bony, his chin a jutting v under the more flexible v of his mouth. His nostrils curved back to make another, smaller, v. His yellow-grey eyes were horizontal. The v motif was picked up again by thickish brows rising outward from twin creases above a hooked nose, and his ...more

flag 21 likes · Like · see review

Dec 16, 2009 Laura rated it did not like it · review of another edition

Recommends it for: Insomniacs and misogynists

Shelves: classics, crime-thriller-suspense, lib-has-audio, library, download-library, 2014, hated

I love detective fiction. This was a horrible, horrible book. I can think of no redeeming qualities in it to recommend it to a single soul. Hmm....perhaps if you're suffering from insomnia, and find yourself awake at 3am, and you've already counted a couple of thousand sheep, and you're losing hope of ever seeing Mr. Sandman again? You might consider it.

Or, if you're a weak, ineffectual man who's never had a date in his life, and enjoys acting out his hopelessly unrealized fantasies in which he ...more

flag 19 likes · Like · see review

Oct 13, 2017 Bonnie Shores rated it liked it

Shelves: mystery

RTC

flag 18 likes · Like · see review

Nov 07, 2008 Maureen rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: favourites, novels, noir

there are these big stories, stories that aren't necessarily long but are tremendously meaningful. they carry seeds of big things, of fundamental truths, that whisper to us of some big answer, the kind of answer we might wish for or even dread but don't dare believe. chipping away at the bumpers in the pinball game of our brains, these are ideas that compel us, that make us pause, and consider just what it's all about, and where we fit in. there's a story like that in this book. it's called the there are these big stories, stories that aren't necessarily long but are tremendously meaningful. they carry seeds of big things, of fundamental truths, that whisper to us of some big answer, the kind of answer we might wish for or even dread but don't dare believe. chipping away at the bumpers in the pinball game of our brains, these are ideas that compel us, that make us pause, and consider just what it's all about, and where we fit in. there's a story like that in this book. it's called the flitcraft story. you can read it, out of the context of the novel here: http://unfutz.blogspot.com/2006/11/30...

i love that story. i come back to it constantly when i read other stories, looping back to thinking who am i? can i change? can anybody? and how it is a perfect encapsulation of all the hope and fear i have about being and identity. i find myself muttering about beams falling, and looking up above me, hoping for one to come crashing down, to start me in a different direction even if it won't be entirely fresh.

i know. at this point you're probably thinking that i'm supposed to be reviewing the maltese falcon and i haven't said very much about the novel as a whole. it's not my favourite hammett book, though i love it for showcasing so many of hammett's strengths. and absolutely, even without the flitcraft story, the maltese falcon has a lot to recommend it: hammett's powerfully terse prose, his biting, honest dialogue, the prototypical hard-boiled blond devil called sam spade with all his "v"s, and a story of misdirection rightly recognized as bedrock in the detective novel genre. so i can honestly say even without the flitcraft story this novel succeeds. but with flitcraft as part of a novel, hammett sets up the story within the story in a way that balances the characters, and the novel itself: in the midst of all these lies, and games, there is that knowing that there is that answer just out of reach, in a matter of circumstance.

hammett is one of my all-time favourite authors. i think every book he wrote is worth reading, and that his writing is instructive. i will not compare him to others -- i believe as much as possible, one has to take him entirely on his own merits.

due diligence done.

last year, a recurrence of flitcraft obsession led me to the quote below, which comes from a memoir written by hammett's daughter, jo: Dashiell Hammett: A Daughter Remembers. it made me really happy that he took such pride in the thousand words that mean so much to me, especially that last line.

"My father and I were out on the lawn in the backyard of my mother's house in West L.A. There was a blanket on the grass and cards spread out. My father had been playing solitaire. He was in a good mood, leaning back against the lawn chair, wearing trunks and the sandals he'd asked me to find in Westwood. And out of nowhere particular he told me the Flitcraft story ... He told it with such delight and enjoyment, like a funny story you want to share ..." She describes the story, then adds, "What I remember is his delight in the story -- as if it were a gift he had received that was just right. As a boy he had wanted to find the Ultimate Truth -- how the world operated. And here it was. There was no system except blind chance. Beams falling."

beams falling. adjust to them not falling. or perhaps pray for them to, as the case may be. ...more

flag 18 likes · Like · see review

Nov 16, 2011 Shovelmonkey1 rated it liked it

Recommends it for: fans of the feisty heist

Recommended to Shovelmonkey1 by: 1001 books list

Shelves: 1001-books, bookcrossing-books, i-spy-with-my-little-eye, read-in-2011

Sam Spade, slow baked, hard boiled detective is hired by the mysterious red head Miss Wonderley to track down her kidnapped sister.... or so he thinks. The trail doesn't even get a chance to warm up when Sam Spade's soft boiled detective partner is shot in the chest. Dead men don't tell tales and so it's up to Sam pick up the trail and add two and two together, which incidentally in this case makes $10,000. Sam is also forced to decide if a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush when he finds ...more

flag 18 likes · Like · see review

Feb 06, 2016 Steve rated it really liked it

Shelves: crime-badness-noir, fiction

Good stuff. I can't believe it's taken me this long to read The Maltese Falcon. I guess part of the problem was the movie. I've seen it a zillion times -- and I'm not necessarily a Falcon junkie. It's a great flick. Bogart and rest of the cast are terrific, and it's fairly faithful to the book. But with that kind of saturation, I found as I attempted to read it the past, that everything in the book seemed too familiar, and I would usually set it down 20 or 30 pages in. And then, just now, along Good stuff. I can't believe it's taken me this long to read The Maltese Falcon. I guess part of the problem was the movie. I've seen it a zillion times -- and I'm not necessarily a Falcon junkie. It's a great flick. Bogart and rest of the cast are terrific, and it's fairly faithful to the book. But with that kind of saturation, I found as I attempted to read it the past, that everything in the book seemed too familiar, and I would usually set it down 20 or 30 pages in. And then, just now, along came a dense Henry James novel. After several attempts to finish that beast, I finally gave up and picked The Maltese Falcon. Immediately, with Hammett's crisp, clear sentences, I felt myself being extricated from the Jamesian word swamp. (Yeah!) I also had the extra attraction of reading the "Black Mask" (The Black Lizard Big Book of Black Mask Storiesversion of The Maltese Falcon, which is supposed to be (according to some GR reviewers) "meaner" than the later novel version.

I have no idea what those differences might be, but the version I read is (good news) different than the movie. Oh, the story is structurally the same, but there are intriguing differences that shade the story and add greater depth. For one, you never really know what Sam Spade is thinking. A lot of it is acting on his part, but on two occasions we're told that his hands are shaking! Not quite the cool customer that Bogie portrays. I love Bogie's version, but I also like how Hammett portray's Spade as a man caught in a chess match, who doesn't how many pieces he has to play with, and with distinct knowledge that the clock is running. Right from the start, when his partner Miles Archer is murdered, Spade knows he's in danger. He's been having an affair with Archer's wife, which is going to at some point make him a suspect. He doesn't know the Why of Archer's death, though he does have a link through the mysterious and overpaying client "Miss Wonderly."

What follows is familiar stuff, but the characters of Gutman (the "Fat Man"), Joel Cairo, Wilmer Cook (the gun man), and Brigid O'Shaughnessy (Miss Wonderly), in Hammett's hands seem to possess a greater history than what is suggested in the book. Definitely so in Cairo's case, as it turns out that he and Wilmer Cook (the "tiny fisted boy") are lovers. That certainly wouldn't have sailed in a 1941 film. But I was also left wondering if Cook is in fact Gutman's illegitimate son. Given the betrayals and various fates of certain characters in the book, that's a dark wrinkle (among others) that made this read worthwhile. Both book and movie are great, but they are different.
...more

flag 16 likes · Like · see review

« previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 … next »

new topic
Discuss This Book

topics	posts	views	last activity
Suomalainen lukup...: Maltan haukka (jännityskirjallisuus)	5	11	14 hours, 12 min ago
Why is the Maltese Falcon read today?	2	25	Dec 31, 2017 03:18PM
The Book Vipers: Group Fiction Read - September 2017 - The Maltese Falcon - SPOILERS ALLOWED	3	15	Sep 23, 2017 01:30PM
The Book Vipers: Group Fiction Read - September 2017 - The Maltese Falcon - NO SPOILERS	10	17	Sep 14, 2017 02:14PM
Around the Year i...: The Maltese Falcon, by Dashiell Hammett	7	46	Aug 14, 2017 09:20AM
First Monday Book...: June 2017 Selection	1	6	May 05, 2017 11:12AM
Catching up on Cl...: The Maltese Falcon - Spoilers	17	103	Mar 21, 2017 12:43PM

Readers Also Enjoyed

Genres

Mystery

2,071 users

Fiction

1,406 users

Classics

1,168 users

Mystery > Crime

568 users

Mystery > Noir

493 users

Favorites

378 users

Mystery > Detective

223 users

See top shelves…

About Dashiell Hammett

Dashiell Hammett

1,366 followers

Also wrote as Peter Collinson, Daghull Hammett, Samuel Dashiell, Mary Jane Hammett

Samuel Dashiell Hammett was an American author of hardboiled detective novels and short stories. Among the enduring characters he created are Sam Spade (The Maltese Falcon), Nick and Nora Charles (The Thin Man), and the Continental Op (Red Harvest and The Dain Curse). In addition to the significant influence his nove ...more

More about Dashiell Hammett