The Maltese Falcon

ANNOTATION

One of the Continental Op's most bizarre cases as he is faced with Miss Gabrielle Dain Leggett who has an unfortunate effect on the people around her: they die violently.

FROM THE PUBLISHER

The Continental Op is a short, squat, and utterly unsentimental tank of a private detective. Miss Gabrielle Dain Leggett is young, wealthy, and a devotee of morphine and religious cults. She has an unfortunate effect on the people around her: they have a habit of dying violently. Is Gabrielle the victim of a family curse? Or is the truth about her weirder and infinitely more dangerous? is one of the Continental Op's most bizarre cases, and a tautly crafted masterpiece of suspense.

ANNOTATION

Of Hammett's sixth book, published in 1931, The New York Times wrote "the developing relationships among the characters are as exciting as the unfolding story."

FROM THE PUBLISHER

Paul Madvig was a cheerfully corrupt ward-heeler who aspired to something better: the daughter of Senator Ralph Bancroft Henry, the heiress to a dynasty of political purebreds. Did he want her badly enough to commit murder? And if Madvig was innocent, which of his dozens of enemies was doing an awfully good job of framing him? Dashiell Hammett's tour de force of detective fiction combines an airtight plot, authentically venal characters, and writing of telegraphic crispness.

A one-time detective and a master of deft understatement, Dashiell Hammett virtually invented the hard-boiled crime novel. This classic Hammet work of detective fiction combines an airtight plot, authentically venal characters, and writing of telegraphic crispness.

ANNOTATION

Nick and Nora Charles are Hammett's most enchanting creations, a rich, glamorous couple who solve crimes in between wisecracks and martinis.

FROM THE PUBLISHER

Nick and Nora Charles are Hammett's most enchanting creations, a rich, glamorous couple who solve homicides in between wisecracks and martinis. At once knowing and unabashedly romantic, is a murder mystery that doubles as a sophisticated comedy of manners.

WHAT PEOPLE ARE SAYING

Hammett did over and over what only the best writers ever do...he wrote scenes that seemed never to have been written before.

– Raymond Chandler

The most breathless of Hammett's stories.

– Sinclair Lewis