- Mass Market Paperback
- Publisher: Ballantine Books (Mm); Reissue edition (Jun 1987)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0345349385
- ISBN-13: 978-0345349385
- Product Dimensions: 17.3 x 10.4 x 2.3 cm
- Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (1 customer review)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 5,424,103 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Product Description
Product Description
This is a brand new BBC Radio 4 full-cast dramatisation of a classic Raymond Chandler mystery featuring private eye, Philip Marlowe. Down-and-out drunk Terry Lennox has a problem: his millionaire wife is dead and he needs to get out of LA fast. So he turns to his only friend in the world: Philip Marlowe, Private Investigator. He's willing to help a man down on his luck, but later, Lennox commits suicide in Mexico and things start to turn nasty. Marlowe finds himself drawn into a sordid crowd of adulterers and alcoholics in LA's Idle Valley, where the rich are suffering one big suntanned hangover. Marlowe is sure Lennox didn't kill his wife, but how many more stiffs will turn up before he gets to the truth?
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First Sentence
The first time I laid eyes on Terry Lennox he was drunk in a Rolls-Royce Silver Wraith outside the terrace of The Dancers. Read the first page
Front Cover | Copyright | Excerpt
The first time I laid eyes on Terry Lennox he was drunk in a Rolls-Royce Silver Wraith outside the terrace of The Dancers. Read the first page
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
I'd never read anything by Chandler before I stumbled across this book. To tell you the truth, I hadn't expected much - I'm not a big fan of thrillers in general, and I'd seen too many bad spoofs of the genre to rate it very highly. However, even after the first couple of pages I was pleasantly surprised, to say the least. I suppose Chandler has been badly copied so many times because he is just so damn good. The book begins in a fairly unportenteous way - Philip Marlowe (Private Dick) comes across a rich drunk having a bit of trouble. He helps him out, and an uneasy friendship develops between the two of them. Marlowe senses an underlying decency in this hopeless case, and Lennox (the hopeless alchoholic) finds an honesty in Marlowe that is lacking in the kind of circles he moves in. So, when Lennox finds himself entangled in a pretty dire situation, it's Marlowe who he turns to for help. And so the cynical Private I is swept into a web of lies, corruption and self-deceits - more than that I cannot say without spoiling the various twists in the tale which Chandler has in store. That said, the plot is a little sketchy at times. Sometimes you wonder where things are going - the individual plot threads are strong enough to keep you turning the pages at some speed, but they seem to diverge so much that you wonder if they will ever come together. Well (again not wishing to spoil things), some do, some don't. Suffice it to say that when you finish the book, you don't feel unsatisfied or in any way short-changed. What really makes the book come alive are the one liners which Chandler comes up with. He's a master of metaphors - with five or six words he'll capture an entire character or atmosphere with a completeness it would take other "proper" writers pages to accomplish. He'll use a single offhand sentence in the same way a butterfly collector uses pins to mount his specimens - a few words will spear the situation he's trying to evoke and fix it there in all its complexity and richness. It's that gift that keeps you reading on, and it's that gift that has spawned a thousand pale imitations. I could give countless examples, but I won't - better to read it for yourself; ignore the squirming plot and just admire the rich sparseness of the writing.
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
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80 reviews
116 of 119 people found the following review helpful
Vintage Chandler... his longest, and one of his best...
31 July 2000
Format:Paperback
Every time I finish reading one of Chandler's Marlowe novels, I end up feeling depressed, because it's one less Chandler novel that I can read for the first time. In my mind, he's that good -- he is one of the only writers that I am consistenly incapable of setting down to go to sleep... I finished the last half of "The Long Goodbye" at about 5:00 am -- I was so wrapped up in it, that I failed to notice the time. Alas. Now, as for that review...
IF YOU HAVEN'T READ ANY CHANDLER, you should stop reading this and go take a look at his first Marlowe novel, The Big Sleep. It's worthwhile to read them in order, or at the least, to read that one first... you'll get a good feeling for whether or not you like Marlowe, and you'll learn a bit more about him. Then, if you like that, come back and take another look at this review.
IF YOU HAVE READ OTHER CHANDLER, then you already know, to some degree, what you're in for. You know Chandler's style, and I can promise you that this book offers up more of it, in abundance. I was a little thrown off for the first 50-some pages, because Marlowe has moved out of his trademark apartment and into a small house in a quiet residential neighborhood, and that didn't jive with me... but it works. Marlowe is, in his way, maturing. (If you've read his unfinished final work, Poodle Springs, then you know Marlowe will eventually get married. Perhaps this evolution says as much about Chandler as about his beloved P.I.)
Once the plot starts moving, of course, you're just along for the ride. Like all Marlowe novels, you have that perfect feeling of riding shotgun in the mind and conscience of a fascinating and well-developed character, and it's enough to sustain you through WHATEVER Chandler cares to write about. But, as I said, this is Vintage (no pun intended) Chandler -- some of his best work. Like several other books of his, I would give it more than 5 stars if I could, because nothing he wrote deserves less. The plot develops in three acts, which seem unrelated until he begins to pull them together, and when he does so, it is nothing less than amazing to behold. (I thought I was outguessing him, and knew what was going to happen. Stupid me -- he was still three steps ahead of me, and I had egg all over my face when I was done with the last page. I love him for that.)
If you're a mystery fan, or even a fan of good stylistic writing, this is some of the best stuff you could hope for. Call it pulp if you like, and say that Hammett outsold him if you must, but for my money, Chandler had more style than anyone else who's ever tackled the genre. Marlowe remains one of the best, most complete, and most enjoyable creations of literature that I have ever found, and I only wish that Chandler had left us more of him. *sigh*
BOTTOM LINE: If you haven't read this one yet, I envy you. It's a hell of a ride, and it's got plenty of re-read value. Worth owning, and a must for Chandler fans.
31 of 31 people found the following review helpful
Best book ever? I really think so.
16 April 1998
Format:Paperback
I first read "The Long Goodbye" in 1976, before I had read any other Raymond Chandler novels. The book practically set off an explosion in my brain -- I have been fascinated by Chandler ever since. No other book by Chandler matches this one's emotional tone.
This isn't a mystery novel, it is a great piece of literature. It is about friendship, love and betrayal. And the plot is complex and satisfying. Marlowe is defeated and in pain, and very, very alone.
I have read "Goodbye" three times since 1977 -- most recently last year -- and every time I am just amazed at the effect the book has on me. It possibly just touches me personally, but I really believe it deserves a rating among the great books of all time.
25 of 26 people found the following review helpful
Chandler's very best!
28 July 1999
Format:Paperback
This epic Raymond Chandler novel is his most finely crafted and perhaps the best ever of its genre. Featuring Chandler's world-weary private detective, it mixes an intriguing plot with fascinating social comment. The plot concerns Marlowe's dealings with a drunk named Terry Lennox and his role in an escape from a murder charge to Mexico. Most of the novel, however is taken up in the rich suburbs of L.A. It has everything that all the best Chandler/Marlowe books have, clever, poetic, often humourous dialogue, cynicism, characters who seem tired of life and yet so full of it, and the sun-drenched L.A. setting. Those used to the more pacy narrative writings such as 'The Big Sleep' and 'The Lady in the Lake' may be a tad cool on this book as it spends as much time dissecting the lives of its downtrodden characters as it does unfold the plot. The later film version, brilliant though it is, does not even do this book justice. EVERYONE SHOULD READ THIS BOOK!!
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