Fri 1 Jul 2016
Reviewed by Dan Stumpf: RAYMOND CHANDLER – Five Murderers.
Posted by Steve under Pulp Fiction , Reviews[5] Comments
RAYMOND CHANDLER – Five Murderers. Avon Murder Mystery Monthly #19, digest-sized paperback, 1944; New Avon Library #63, paperback, 1944.
A brightly packaged confection of early stories by Raymond Chandler, including his first, “Blackmailers Don’t Shoot” (1933) and his first first-person narration, “Goldfish” (1936).
Well, they read just like early efforts of a major mystery stylist: the prose is highly-patterned and a bit gaudy, the action scenes plentiful and effective, and the characters sometimes try to behave like something other than figures on a pulp cover.
The only consistent problem is with the stories themselves, which are mostly over-plotted. Chandler sets up a case (usually missing jewels) then side characters come on and make cryptic comments, bodies turn up, heads are sapped, new actors walk on and off, secrets get shared, lies lied, and (in Chandler’s own words) two men come through the door with guns in their hands.
This is a lot of to-do for a sixty-page story, and after about 55 pages of it, everything gets sorted out with a wild shoot-’em-up that leaves the bad guys conveniently dead and the good guys still up and about to close the case.
Pretty awful stuff, really. The wonder is that Chandler’s gifts for sharp characterization and telling prose make it all so pleasant to swallow — and I mean, these are almost compellingly readable. Now and again he slips up — in “Blackmailers” a young starlet opines “They look as if they only existed alter dark, like ghouls. The people are dissipated without grace, sinful without irony.” and it’s all too dearly the author talking, not the character — but in the main these pulp tales are catchy little gems and well worth looking at.
Bibliographic Notes: None of the five stories feature Philip Marlowe; all first appeared in Black Mask magazine. The other three stories are “Guns at Cyrano’s” (1936), “Nevada Gas” (1935) and “Spanish Blood” (1935).
July 2nd, 2016 at 9:20 pm
“Blackmailers Don’t Shoot” was, of course his first, and he never did quite live down that “diffident” streak of gray in Mallory’s hair.
I’ve always liked “Guns at Cyrano’s” just because it was the most like a pulp story of his output, with a well to do hero trying to live down how his family made their money, and because it shows how effectively Chandler could use the third person narrative when he wanted.
Yes, the pulp roots show, which is why he was wary of anthologizing them. But they are splendid examples of the pulp voice and more importantly show his development as a writer.
Try reading this and then read THE LONG GOODBYE — it’s an eye opener.
July 2nd, 2016 at 9:47 pm
As stories from an author who may have been still learning his way, these all stand out above 99% of the competition, not perhaps when compared to other tales in BLACK MASK, but compared to the dreck published in THRILLING DETECTIVE, 10 DETECTIVE ACES and many other second and third rank magazines, these are all true gems.
July 3rd, 2016 at 9:06 pm
A few pulps reprinted hardcover writers like Kurt Steel and Brett Halliday too and had some good hardboiled fiction in them from that, but like most things Sturgeon’s Law sadly applies.
Erle Stanley Gardner managed to get some hard boiled stories in odd ball pulps too like Paul Pry in GANG STORIES.
July 4th, 2016 at 11:20 am
If you collect individual authors rather than long runs of magazine titles, other than the ones Walker mentioned, you’re much better off.
July 4th, 2016 at 11:44 am
Waay true, Steve!