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| The Lady in the Lake (A Philip Marlowe Novel) | 
 enlarge | Author: Raymond Chandler
Creator: Jonathan Kellerman
Publisher: Penguin
Category: Book
List Price: £7.99
Buy Used: £1.50
You Save: £6.49 (81%)
New (28) from £2.98
Avg. Customer Rating:  4 reviews
Sales Rank: 75613
Media: Paperback
Edition: New edition
Pages: 304
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.3
Dimensions (in): 7 x 4.3 x 0.9
ISBN: 0140108947
Dewey Decimal Number: 813
EAN: 9780140108941
ASIN: 0140108947
Publication Date: July 7, 2005
Availability: Usually dispatched within 1-2 business days
Condition: water damaged
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| Customer Reviews:
Underrated Chandler December 4, 2007
The consensus is The Lady in the Lake is not comparable to Chandler's "big three" (Big Sleep, Long Goodbye, Farewell My Lovely), but I found it just as satisfying.
Chandler's writing is oil slick. So easy, so intelligent, so very cool. As usual the characters are somehow subtle but eccentric all at once and the similes and descriptions are stylishly inventive. The plot doesn't weave and deceive as much as some of his other novels but this didn't detract from the story for me.
The Marlowe in TLITL is less hostile, less paranoid, less aggressive than in some of the other novels. This makes me like him more but some readers may prefer his younger, spikier self.
Still, like all the other Chandler-Marlowe novels, reading it is an exceptional way to pass the time. I can only imagine literary snobbery towards crime fiction is the reason why Chandler is not held up as one of the 20th century's greatest writers.
Simply absorbing February 7, 2003
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
Philip Marlowe is hired by Derace Kinsley to find his young and reckless wife who has gone missing. From thereon the plot starts and the reader finds himself identified with the main character. Yet, The Lady in the Lake is not just a detective story, "une nouvelle noire". Chadler doesn't lose the chance to incorporate to his narration the poignant and sarcastic spirit of his hero, while himself mocks the morals of the American society of the 1940s from the point of view of an English romantic observer.
 More than just crime fiction April 9, 2002
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
A book that keeps the reader guessing. The plot is complex but flawlessly handled. The characters are realistic and well-drawn. The pace is fast, but subtly controlled. These factors make this book much more than the average detective fare that's served up by Chandler's imitators.
The descriptions and dialogue are characteristically astonishing and surprising. One character is described as having "a face like a gnawed bone", and there are plenty of other similes as good as that.
The dialogue is so well written that I found myself hearing the characters speak in their correct accent before Chandler specifically declares where they are from. He achieves this without recourse to writing in indecipherable dialect.
This book is very good, not maybe as outstanding as say, "The Long Goodbye", but it's better than most other detective fiction.
A cracking hard boiled crime novel November 21, 2001
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
Chandler has been over this ground before but The Lady in the Lake takes him out of the city and into rural mountains.The result is a contrast between his hero's city smart 'shamus'and the country cute lawman which is a sub-plot of its own that lends a pacy air to the main storyline.Marlowe is slicker and smarter than ever,but ,as usual ,makes errors which humanise and make the reader identify with him.We are shown the seedy side of the hustle lifestyle of '30s and 40's LA ,while silently respecting the humanity of the hero ,who speaks through the book in the first person. There are tough dames,weak rats and hard men side by side with the vulnerable and soft-all the characters are believable and Chandler portrays them in a way that makes them clear in the imagination.There are no tricks to the tale-the crime almost becomes secondary as the simple vices of people take controls of their lives .This is a great read,a hard boiled thriller which is as good as it gets and can be read over and over.
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