Reviews

The Long Goodbye by Raymond Chandler

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robnobody's review against another edition

Man, I was really into Raymond Chandler in my late teens/early twenties. Hell, I STILL have MarlowePI as my usual forum name. Anyway, this was Chandler's second-to-last completed novel, and generally agreed to be his last good one. It's a little more meandering and philosophical than his earlier Marlowe novels, showing a little more of the day-to-day life of being a private eye that doesn't involve the Big Cases, with character digressions on consumerism, mass production, the nature of crime and the police, alcoholism, writing, alcoholic writers, and the different types of blondes (...Chandler was paid by the word.) There's the cringey sexism, racism, and homophobia endemic to the time period and the genre, though it's a little hard to tell if they reflect more on the character narrator (as sort of comes across with the racism) or on the author (as really seems the case with the other two), or if there's any difference. This was also Chandler's most personal novel, dealing heavily with two different alcoholics and their effects on the people around them. Of course, the real draw is Chandler's patented snappy tough-guy sarcasm, with this one including some of my favorites lines, like “The girl gave him a look which ought to have stuck at least four inches out of his back," and "He had short red hair and a face like a collapsed lung."

Ray Porter on the whole does a great job with the narration, bringing the appropriate level of weary, cynical snarkiness to Marlowe, and bringing a startling amount of variation to the many males voices. It was just a little disappointing, then, for the only two major female characters to have basically the same breathy falsetto.

mrblonde91's review against another edition

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5.0

Particularly impressed that it's aged so well since it's a genre piece.

matthewcutchen's review against another edition

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5.0

Finally finished reading my first Raymond Chandler novel—aka all my favorite authors’ and filmmakers’ favorite author.

And I’d have to agree.

Happy Noirvember, everybody.

pastaylor's review against another edition

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2.0

I struggled with this. First off there was a lot of racism towards the mexican characters which was a product of when it was written but still rough. But mostly it was just an old guy ranting under the guise of a mystery. So many screeds that might as well been in all caps. Chandler wrote this when he was struggling with the death of his wife, with alcoholism, and with writing and a lot of the book feels like him journaling his issues out. Scott bricks hard boiled narration did t help. A tough hang for me.