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Double Indemnity (Crime Masterworks) (Paperback)

by James M. Cain (Author)
4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)

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Product details

  • Paperback: 144 pages
  • Publisher: Orion; New Ed edition (21 Mar 2002)
  • Language English
  • ISBN-10: 0752847694
  • ISBN-13: 978-0752847696
  • Product Dimensions: 19.2 x 12.8 x 1.6 cm
  • Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
  • Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 271,008 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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    #5 in  Books > Crime, Thrillers & Mystery > Authors, A-Z > C > Cain, James M.

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Product Description

Product Description

Walter Huff is an insurance investigator like any other until the day he meets the beautiful and dangerous Phyllis Nirdlinger and falls under her spell. Together they plot to kill her husband and split the insurance. It'll be the perfect murder ...


About the Author

James M. Cain was born in Annapolis, Maryland, in 1892. Having served in the US Army in World War 1, he became a journalist in Baltimore and New York in the 1920's. He later worked as a screenwriter in Hollywood. Cain died in 1977
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Customer Reviews

4 Reviews
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Average Customer Review
4.8 out of 5 stars (4 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
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9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars A Cracking Read, 21 Oct 2002
This book came in a boxset of ten other crime authors, so I read the book only by chance. The writer doesn't waste any words and this book rattles by like an express train. The book complements The Maltese Falcon as perfect noir. You will find yourself just as caught up as the protagonist. I cannot recommend this book highly enough. The Falcon and this book were both made into popular films but both started life as excellent books.
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4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars A masterpiece, 27 Feb 2005
By The Fisher Price King "Straight from the gut" (London) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)   
This is, quite simply, one of the great novels in this genre. If you're looking at this, there's a chance you're either familiar with Cain (in which case this is his best book, so go ahead an read it) or you've been directed here because of a love of, say, Chandler or Hammett, in which case you really need to know about Cain, who is desperately underreated. A book to own and cherish and re-read. The Crime Masterworks edition is a good one, although I have a marginal preference for the more durable Everyman edition of Cain's fiction.
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6 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars "He's very unhappy. He'll be better off dead, won't he?", 2 Jan 2006
By Mary Whipple (New England) - See all my reviews
(TOP 10 REVIEWER)   
This review is from: Double Indemnity (Paperback)
This classic mystery from 1935 details the complicity of Walter Huff, an insurance agent, and Phyllis Nirdlinger, in the death of Phyllis's husband, one of Huff's insurance clients. Huff has persuaded Nirdlinger to take out an accidental death policy which pays double if his death occurs on a train, and Huff and Phyllis, who become lovers, agree to share the benefits. Planning for every contingency down to the last detail, the two accomplish their goals, but the insurance company does not want to pay off, and Walter's bosses become convinced that the death was either a suicide or a murder.

As the investigation becomes more intense, Walter and Phyllis become more and more frantic with worry, especially when Nirdlinger's twenty-year-old daughter and her boyfriend also start to investigate. Filled with twists and turns, the novel's conclusion comes as a complete surprise.

This hard-boiled, noir story is entirely plot-based, with cardboard characters who are not believable even within their limited development here. Walter Huff is a realist and sees through Phyllis from the moment he meets her, predicts all aspects of her behavior, and even mocks her in his first person narrative, yet the story depends on his falling in love with her. He is an insurance agent dealing daily with the real world, and he appears to have no financial worries, yet he engages in murder because of his "love" for Phyllis. His murder of Nirdlinger, planned for weeks and executed without remorse, suddenly inspires second thoughts--after the fact. Phyllis proves to be staunch in the face of the murder, even though she said initially that she didn't even dislike her husband--and that it seemed wrong to murder him for money.

The clipped dialogue and terse narrative, characteristics Cain shares with Raymond Chandler and Dashiel Hammett, move the action along quickly, but today's reader cannot help but smile at how dated and overly dramatic the story is, its prose self-conscious and, at times, even cute. Still, the story is very well plotted (with the possible exception of the conclusion), and Cain's attention to detail makes the mystery both clever and engaging. Tame by today's standards, this story was a milestone in the growth of the murder mystery, its tour de force ending unforgettable--great fun to read. Mary Whipple

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Most Recent Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars A classic for a rainy afternoon
I have come late to the world of James M Cain, having found him amongst the interviewees in "The Paris Review Interviews, volume 1" itself one of the must-reads of 2007. Read more
Published on 12 Aug 2007 by Mr. S. Miller

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