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Authors, Fiction, Reading, Reviews

My top ten mystery list

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Photo credit, Getty Images via Unsplash license.

Today is my birthday. Don’t ask which one. If anybody out there wants a birthday, you can have one of mine. I have a lot more than I need.

My friend Hunter Baker, of North Greenville University, has given tongue to the voice of multitudes, thus: “When, oh when,” those multitudes ask, “will Lars Walker offer a Top Ten list of his favorite mystery novels?”

To which I reply, “Why would anybody care what my favorite mystery novels are?”

Nevertheless, the challenge has been delivered, and I shall endeavor to give satisfaction.

First, some clarifications.

This list is not, and does not purport to be, an actual list of Best Books. There are whole swathes (I’ve grown uncertain how to pronounce that word: I’ve always rhymed it with “moths,” but other people rhyme it was “lathes.” Most troubling) of the mystery genre which I’ve rarely or never tried. Especially in the Cozy vein. Many passionate (sometimes frightening) people are devoted to Cozies; I haven’t got the nerve to laugh at them. I’ll just note that Cozy is not my cuppa arsenic-laced tea and, having writ, move on.

Agatha Christie remains, I believe, the most popular mystery writer in the world. I’ve read some Christie, but was not won over. Her focus is on the puzzle, not on the characters. Her readers delight in following clues and trying to figure out whodunnit before the Big Reveal at the end.

Me, I gave up solving mysteries long ago. On the rare occasions when I’m able to outthink the sleuth in a story, it’s usually because the author tipped his/her hand through trying to misdirect me in some way, and I caught him/her at it. I’m a better storyteller than a detective.

I read mysteries mostly to live vicariously through the characters and to observe them acting in extreme situations. I am not a man of action; I’ve managed to cram, I’d estimate, ten or twelve years of living into my three-score and several years of life.

With all this understood, here’s my Top Ten list. Purely personal, biased and subjective. Delivered with no authority whatever.

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Fiction, Reviews

‘The Big Sleep,’ by Raymond Chandler

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Her smile was tentative, but could be persuaded to be nice.

Recently I watched an old interview with Andrew Klavan in which he cited The Big Sleep, the first Philip Marlowe novel (1939), which he admires very much. He mentioned how he adopted Marlowe as a literary hero when he read the first scene of this book, where the detective enters the palatial Sternwood mansion. Above the door he sees a stained glass window depicting a knight attempting to free a maiden tied to a tree. Marlowe doesn’t think the knight is trying as hard as he could, and thinks that if he lived there he’d have to climb up himself and help out.

That, Klavan says (and I agree), is the key to Philip Marlowe’s character. He’s a knight out of romance, plunked down in the 20th Century where he has no place. His adventures involve him in many compromises, but he strives to keep some honor.

Even when the fair maidens don’t really deserve rescuing, as is the case in The Big Sleep. Old General Sternwood, confined to a wheelchair, has summoned Marlowe because he has received blackmail demands related to his daughter Carmen. Carmen is flighty, promiscuous, and not very bright. He also mentions a man named Rusty Regan, ex-husband to his other daughter Vivian. The general liked Rusty, but the man has disappeared. He hopes he’s all right. Marlowe intuits (correctly) that the general isn’t really much concerned over the blackmail; he’s trying to work up to asking Marlowe to locate Rusty.

Soon Marlowe will be a near-witness to a murder, with Carmen Sternwood present (high on drugs). Then the body will disappear. And Marlowe will find himself looking for Rusty Regan after all – not because he cares about the Sternwood daughters, but for the old man’s sake.

The Big Sleep is an intriguing book. Plot-wise it’s confusing and not neatly tied up. The author himself, famously, wasn’t sure who killed the Sternwood chauffeur. And there’s one scene where Marlowe is captured by a notorious murderer, who then conveniently goes away, leaving him to be watched by a suggestible woman whom Marlowe persuades to free him. (A very weak plot device, you can’t deny.)

And yet this book is treasured by readers and critics alike. I treasure it myself. The prose is masterful, the characters are fascinating, the atmosphere draws you in, and the conclusion has been a model for all but the most cynical of hard-boiled writers ever since.

On this reading I was particularly struck by a minor character, the purest hero of this story. His name is Harry Jones. He’s a short, unprepossessing man, a two-bit gambler. Yet he makes the ultimate sacrifice for a woman who doesn’t deserve him. Marlowe pays him the greatest respect – he’s the man Marlowe would like to be, but pure knights of that sort do not survive in our world.

Taken all in all, The Big Sleep is a great novel. If you haven’t read it and like hard-boileds, you should. Cautions for drugs and sexual situations – pretty racy stuff for 1939.