The Annotated Big Sleep by Raymond Chandler

    THE BIG SLEEP remains one of the greatest detective novels of all time and while I prefer Dashielle Hammett over Raymond Chandler, it's only by degrees. It's also interesting to note the flaws of the narrative that is a Frankenstein's monster of combined short-stories of Raymond Chandler's previous short stories that give the book a somewhat disjointed episodic feel that only slightly hurts it. Basically, the Big Sleep is a bunch of stories from his previous work in Pulp Detective magazines like BLACK MASK that he created a loose narrative combining and then making them all star Phillip Marlowe.

    The premise is an old millionaire hires Phillip to get back some dirty pictures of his possibly mentally ill daughter, Carmen, that we're not sure are the reason for a blackmail attempt until our protagonist finds her standing over the dead body of said blackmailer while stark naked. From there, the bodies start piling up and Phillip becomes determined to solve the missing person's case of a bootlegger married into the millionaire's family. This despite the fact he wasn't hired to look into the missing person's case and most of the murders are instantly solved.

    There's some plot holes like the fact that the chauffeur's murder is never really solved (personally, I believe he drove into the reservoir due to a head injury) and the fact that Geiger being murdered by Carmen makes more sense than the chauffeur doing it. However, it's really about style over substance and there's plenty of substance. Marlowe is the original wise-cracking detective and constantly giving backtalk to the people around him, which is a style often repeated but never duplicated.

    It's also interesting to compare/contrast this to the movie starring Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall. There's absolutely no romance between Mrs. Regan and Phillip Marlowe in the book and he's not even that attracted to her, which makes an interesting change. Obviously, the movie also wanted to make Bacall's character less morally compromised than the book--which makes it clear the Sternwoods are awful people.

    Phillip Marlowe is far more erudite, charming, and witty than Sam Spade. Also, better educated as he plays chess in his spare time and has a college education. However, he's also a flat out nicer person and not motivated by the money. Which is oddly why, between the two, I prefer Sam Spade. I feel like a bit more mercenary motivation would make a more compelling protagonist. He's also above the influence with sex and other temptations. I have to admit I prefer my protagonists a bit more flawed. He seems determined to solve the mystery, mostly, because everyone keeps trying to keep him from doing so.

    The other characters are memorable and interesting as well with a large cast of characters that are still all able to be kept straight in my head. The Sternwood Sisters, the General, Eddie Mars, Canino, and so on. Raymond Chandler puts some interesting spins on the concept of the "honorable gangster" with Eddie Mars proving to be anything but yet capable of putting on a good front. There's a reason an entire genre of fiction came from both this book as well as The Maltese Falcon.

    The annotated version of the book isn't quite as impressive as I think people believe as a lot of the annotations are unnecessary. I mean, a lot of the slang explained is self-explanatory or still commonly used. We also don't need the author explaining, "Yes, Raymond Chandler was kind of homophobic." Some speculations like how much the book goes on about the beauty of men were also reaching. Oddly, the best notes are the ones that point out where Raymond is stealing from himself.

    Overall, a must-read for every detective fan but you should get the original.  

9/10