levishak 's review for:

The Maltese Falcon by Dashiell Hammett

5.0

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No doubt about it, this novel is a classic, written by a master of the hard-boiled crime story. The Maltese Falcon became a wildly popular movie and a fine model for film noir. Dashiell Hammett wrote in a sparse, direct style, emphasizing action and dialogue. Through these devices, his characters become real. The plot and the characters can be found in movies, books, and television shows of today. Hammett hints at homosexuality in some of the characters and supposedly influenced Lillian Hellman to write The Children’s Hour, a famous play about two women who are suspected of being lesbians.