- Paperback: 166 pages
- Publisher: Vintage Books; 1st Vintage Books Ed edition (1 Dec 1991)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0394757661
- ISBN-13: 978-0394757667
- Product Dimensions: 13.3 x 1.3 x 20.3 cm
- Average Customer Review: 3.4 out of 5 stars See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 1,861,765 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Product Description
Product Description
Marlowe is hired by an influential lawyer he's never herd of to tail a gorgeous redhead, but decides he prefers to help out the redhead. She's been acquitted of her alcoholic husband's murder, but her father-in-law prefers not to take the court's word for it.
"Chandler wrote like a slumming angel and invested the sun-blinded streets of Los Angeles with a romantic presence:" -- Ross Macdonald
"Chandler wrote like a slumming angel and invested the sun-blinded streets of Los Angeles with a romantic presence:" -- Ross Macdonald
About the Author
Best-known as the creator of the original private eye, Philip Marlowe, Raymond Chandler was born in Chicago in 1888 and died in 1959. Many of his books have been adapted for the screen, and he is widely regarded as one of the very greatest writers of detective fiction.
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First Sentence
The voice on the telephone seemed to be sharp and peremptory, but I didn't hear too well what it said -partly because I was only half-awake and partly because I was holding the receiver upside down. Read the first page Browse Sample Pages
Front Cover | Copyright | Excerpt | Back Cover
The voice on the telephone seemed to be sharp and peremptory, but I didn't hear too well what it said -partly because I was only half-awake and partly because I was holding the receiver upside down. Read the first page Browse Sample Pages
Front Cover | Copyright | Excerpt | Back Cover
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
A sharp, witty, stylish novel.,
By A Customer
This review is from: Playback (Paperback)
Philip Marlowe rousted from his bed, by 'Clyde Umney, the lawyer', finds himself dispatched to meet the San Diego train, to follow a melancholy redhead; armed with a general description and his fees been paid up front, courtesy of a snobby blonde secretary.It doesn't take Marlowe long to discover that the redheads in trouble, and the ever chivalrous Marlowe gives her a helping hand, as he try's to figure out why he's been hired to follow her, and why she's in a jam. As he digs into the case Marlowe uncovers a labyrinth of blackmailers, a body that moves, bitter rich old men, an arrogant PI, a gigolo, a psychopath, a racketeer, decent policemen and disaffected low life's. Bad girls and one-nightstands, he gets the Snobby blonde with the wining line, 'what are you doing tonight? And don't tell me you've got a date with four sailors again?' The novel leaves you wondering how Marlowe ever makes a living when he spends most of his time either giving money back or refusing it. It's a wonderfully distilled story, sharp and to the point. Although not his greatest work Chandler still gives you the usual superb characterisations, dialogue, wit and style, providing a very lucid feeling of America mid-twentieths century.
7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Chandler, but not as we know him,
By
This review is from: Playback (Paperback)
I'm a big Chandler fan, have taught The Big Sleep as a text at A level and generally think he's a great writer with a flair for creating an authentic environment for his authentic characters to run around in and get up to mischief.
Playback just doesn't quite pass muster in these terms. The environments are still authentic but somehow not brought to life in the same way. The characters are shallower somehow; they seem almost like caricatures of hardboiled days gone by. It feels like he's forcing it. Where novels like The Big Sleep and The Long Goodbye et al seem to unfold effortlessly around Philip Marlowe's everyman, in Playback it all seems to be being pushed through. There's less a sense of being involved in something and more of chasing something that doesn't quite ever get captured. Still worth a read if you're a fan of the genre, of Chandler, or just of a good book, but not on a par with the mastery of his earlier novels. Marlowe himself says halfway through the book that he hopes he might wake up knowing what the hell he's supposed to be doing; I couldn't help wonder if Chandler had thought the same thing while writing it.
9 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Philip Marlowes existential wanderings in Esmeralda,
By A Customer
This review is from: Playback (Paperback)
Playback isn't an ideal introduction into Raymond Chandler's Philip Marlowe novels. In fact the final chapter will only be understood by people who have previously read The Long Goodbye.Very little actually happens in Playback. There's only one murder and very little fighting. Marlowe spends most of the novel just trying to figure out exactly what he's supposed to be doing. Marlowe eventually cracks a mystery, but to satisfy his own curiosity, not on the instructions of his client. Marlowe is more reflective than ever and there are some wonderful meditations. This isn't a detective novel, it's a novel featuring a detective. The mystery is not the key element of this book, rather it is a meditation on the power structures of a wealthy small town. Chandler fanatics talk about Playback with a hushed reverence. Read it and you gain access to Marlowe's soul. Or is it Raymond Chandler?
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