There is a thread which ties Raymond Chandler, Howard Hawks, William Faulkner and George Lucas together and that is the unusual talent of Leigh Brackett. Brackett, whose first novel
No Good From a Corpse, caught the attention of Hawks, was brought in to "improve" the screenplay Faulkner was struggling with: Chandler's The Big Sleep -- among the iconic films of film noir ... and the film which cemented the reputation of Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall as Hollywood's most sizzling couple. Brackett had already written science fiction stories and wrote extensively in the field throughout her life, her last project being the original draft of The Empire Strikes Back in the Star Wars series.
Ed Clive is a private detective in Los Angeles with a young sidekick name Jonathan Ladd Jones. Clive has a friendly stalemate sort of relationship with Homicide Division's Detective Lieutenant Jordan Gaines. When Clive and his buddy Mick Hammond turn up in the apartment of murdered nightclub singer Laurel Dane, Hammond is tossed into jail; Clive sets out to clear his friend's, and his own, name. Hammond's wife, Jane Alcott, is loaded and holds the key to the family fortune -- leaving siblings Richard and Vivien fuming (and drinking). Enter an ex-con with an alibi, some no goods from the club, and an assortment of noirish backdrops and Chandleresque dialogue ... the often brutal encounters between characters keeps the pulse thumping and the plot twisting, twisting, twisting ... who did it and die he or she do all of it?
It's not clear to me why this novel, first published in 1944, is in the public domain but what a treat it is. You can practically feel the fog roll in, smell the wet asphalt and ... what perfume was that dame wearing? The plot could have been a little less convoluted but that, too, is part of the charm. What a pit Ms Brackett wrote so little in this genre after what has to be considered a first rate debut.
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