Philip Marlowe’s Guide to Life

Raymond Chandler’s classic gumshoe Philip Marlowe is the quintessential American detective. His effortless masculinity, smoldering sexuality, and verbal fleetness remain the embodiment of cool. He liked liquor, women, and working alone. And, in a world defined by betrayal, mistrust, and double-dealing, Marlowe’s rough exterior belies an unshakable code of honor. Taken together, his observations and witticisms represent some of the most scathing and brilliant writing in crime fiction, and coalesce into a wonderfully alluring worldview: a vision of unswerving righteousness, accountability, and stylish conduct in a sea of turpitude and injustice.

Philip Marlowe’s Guide to Life is an elegant, A–Z compendium of Marlowe’s ever-more-relevant observations about crime, women, work, sex, good, evil, and life in the big city. Chandler’s genius transcended genre; though he seemed to single-handedly invent noir, his work ventured beyond it into an idiom all its own, and he left behind a legacy of grit and disarming beauty. Here is a brilliant and loving tribute to that legacy, sure to delight fans old and new.