Random Thoughts... on Writers

So, you've finally managed to set aside some free time to read a good book. Could be that you're on your way to the library or bookstore (or online retailer...) with the hope of finding the right read. Or, you might have a stack next to you now, and be diligently thumbing through the covers, trying to find one book - just one - that appears genuinely interesting.

The following is the first part in what will, I hope, be a growing list of authors and books that I have found to be genuinely interesting. The list stems from my own tastes and experience, and as such it is, of course, entirely subjective. It is designed simply to aide you, the reader, in the process of choosing your own reading material.


Authors, Part 1
Raymond Chandler
The genre of crime fiction has produced a number of memorably good authors - Cain, Hammett, Highsmith, and modern day masters like Parker and Leonard. And while all of them have their genuine merits, few within the genre (or outside of it, for that matter) have ever bettered Chandler in terms of sheer style. This was a man who could write as well as any of his literary contemporaries, and he not only helped to refine the style of noir fiction, he proved that the genre could be literary. His most famous creation - Philip Marlowe - is, like Chandler, a bit of an outsider: smart, hard drinking, and a slightly cynical observer of the society that surrounds and employs him.

If you've decided to venture into the land of crime fiction, Chandler is an excellent author with which to begin. The Library of America has produced a very fine two-volume collection of Chandler's novels, and this is an excellent place to begin if you've committed yourself to reading his longer works.

Though one need not read his novels in order of publication, I do recommend starting with the first volume - The Big Sleep. It is Chandler's best book, and it serves as an excellent introduction to Marlowe and his world. Strange characters, snappy, sometimes withering dialogue and fabulously convoluted plots populate all of his novels, but the first title remains the best. Nonetheless, all of his books are worth a read - particularly Farewell, My Lovely, The Lady in the Lake, and The Long Goodbye. The last title is Chandler's longest novel, and it does suffer a bit from its length. It could have used some judicious editing - as some critics have noted, the tightness of plot that so aided the earlier novels is absent here. But it also contains some of Chandler's most personal writing - and that is worth checking out.