Publishers Weekly
★ 06/19/2023
Mina (The Less Dead) successfully emulates the language and tone of Raymond Chandler’s hard-boiled novels featuring California P.I. Marlowe in this terrific pastiche. Though Marlowe has been instrumental in solving the murder of cowboy actor Pasco Pete, the gumshoe is unsettled by a sense he missed something. There’s no time to reopen the investigation, however, as he’s summoned to help the überwealthy Chadwick Montgomery track down his missing 22-year-old daughter, Chrissie, who vanished from the family estate the morning after her engagement party. Despite his distaste for Montgomery and uncertainty about whether Chrissie wants to be found, Marlowe accepts the case, which quickly leads to the discovery of multiple bodies, the revelation of Montgomery family secrets, and possible links to Pasco Pete’s death. The search is further complicated by the presence of Marlowe’s professional rival, detective Anne Riordan, whom Montgomery has also retained to find Chrissie. On top of nailing Chandler’s atmospherics (“Out on Santa Monica the heat was oiling up from the ground. Dust whipped past us on a spiteful breeze”), Mina delivers a truly surprising plot. Noir fans will hope Mina returns to the mean streets of L.A. again soon. Agent: Henry Dunow, Dunow, Carlson & Lerner Literary. (Aug.)
From the Publisher
Denise Mina is an even better writer than Raymond Chandler. She’s also a one-of-a-kind storyteller. I’ll leave it at that."—James Patterson
“Mina’s evocation of time and place is noteworthy, and her Chandleresque one-liners provoke appropriate amusement . . . her book, with its vivid scene-setting and spot-on dialogue, is perhaps the most pleasing and affecting Marlowe pastiche yet.”—Wall Street Journal
"What a pleasure to read my beloved Philip Marlowe as imagined by one of my favorite working crime writers. Denise Mina has the vision, wit, and soul to bring Marlowe and the Los Angeles of our noir dreams glimmering darkly to life." —Steph Cha, author of Your House Will Pay
“Terrific . . . On top of nailing Chandler’s atmospherics, Mina delivers a truly surprising plot. Noir fans will hope Mina returns to the mean streets of L.A. again soon.”—Publishers Weekly (starred review)
"There are scenes in which the cadences and worldview and those tricky similes are spot on. . . . What’s most striking is Mina’s updating of Marlowe’s cultural attitudes . . . as his acceptance of Anne Riordan as a fellow professional suggests, this Marlowe recognizes that women can be more than just dangerous dames or helpless frails."—The Washington Post
“Mina has obviously made a close study of Chandler’s particular brand of poetics, while still bringing her own enviable style to the story . . . Mina also brings a critical eye to Marlowe in the best sense possible: understanding him in his core. His weaknesses are on display, but so is the deep strain of romanticism underpinning this seemingly immortal literary character.”—CrimeReads
“A pitch perfect, cinematic homage to the master of noir crime fiction, Raymond Chandler, and his timeless hero, Philip Marlowe. Using whip-smart dialogue, and lush, sensual descriptions of the City of Angels, from Skid Row to the mansions of Beverly Hills, Mina's Marlowe faces danger at every turn with wit, compassion, and bourbon-proof smarts. I loved this book!”—Kathleen Kent, author of The Dime and Black Wolf
"Playful in its early stages, as Mina cheekily piles on Marlowe’s trademark similes . . . Female-forward in all sorts of ways—quite a change of pace for the legendary gumshoe."—Kirkus Reviews
“Perfectly rendered . . . . Mina has the world-weary, florid voice of Chandler’s P.I. down pat. The tropes, the mise-en-scène, the unforgettable characters, the convoluted, Chandler-esque plot—they’re all here, with Mina’s creative, timely-but-not-anachronistic touches. Fans of the original books (and movies) starring Marlowe will appreciate his return; those who like re-creations of classics, such as the HBO Perry Mason series starring Matthew Rhys and Juliet Rylance, will enjoy this outing.”—Library Journal (starred review)
“Mina’s Marlowe is a smart, inspired take on a character we have come to take for granted, who’s as problematic as he is adored. The Second Murderer takes him on a slightly different trajectory, both honoring him and challenging him to be a better man for a changing world.”—Alta
author of Your House Will Pay Steph Cha
'What a pleasure to read my beloved Philip Marlowe as imagined by one of my favorite working crime writers. Denise Mina has the vision, wit, and soul to bring Marlowe and the Los Angeles of our noir dreams glimmering darkly to life."
#1 New York Times bestselling author James Patterson
Denise Mina is an even better writer than Raymond Chandler. She’s also a one-of-a-kind storyteller. I’ll leave it at that.”
author of The Dime and Black Wolf Kathleen Kent
A pitch perfect, cinematic homage to the master of noir crime fiction, Raymond Chandler, and his timeless hero, Philip Marlowe. Using whip-smart dialogue, and lush, sensual descriptions of the City of Angels, from Skid Row to the mansions of Beverly Hills, Mina's Marlowe faces danger at every turn with wit, compassion, and bourbon-proof smarts. I loved this book!”
James Patterson
Denise Mina is an even better writer than Raymond Chandler. She’s also a one-of-a-kind storyteller. I’ll leave it at that.
Library Journal
★ 07/07/2023
Scottish novelist Mina (Confidence; The Less Dead) effortlessly segues into Raymond Chandler's Los Angeles with this perfectly rendered Philip Marlowe noir. She has the world-weary, florid voice of Chandler's P.I. down pat. as he narrates the bewildering case of a missing heiress, Chrissie Montgomery, and puzzles over a previous case involving the murder of a brokedown cowboy extra named Pasco Pete. He dislikes his client, Chrissie's cold, contemptuous father, and is mystified by the man's secretary, who appears to be his punching bag. Marlowe is also beguiled by P.I. Anne Riordan, who once wanted to be part of his agency but now runs a sleuthing service of her own. Riordan's been hired by Mr. Montgomery as well, so it becomes a race to find Chrissie. Their investigations, together and apart, take them to all the worst places in L.A., and to a murder in a skid-row hotel. The tropes, the mise-en-scène, the unforgettable characters, the convoluted, Chandler-esque plot—they're all here, with Mina's creative, timely-but-not-anachronistic touches. VERDICT Fans of the original books (and movies) starring Marlowe will appreciate his return; those who like re-creations of classics, such as the HBO Perry Mason series starring Matthew Rhys and Juliet Rylance, will enjoy this outing and hope for more Marlowe and Riordan adventures from Mina.—Liz French
SEPTEMBER 2023 -- AudioFile
A Beverly Hills heiress has gone missing, and maybe she doesn't want to be found. In this "authorized" Raymond Chandler mystery Scottish crime writer Denise Mina and Golden Voice narrator Scott Brick team up to flawlessly re-create one of the toughest, most poetic, most human voices in all of fiction. Tracking the young socialite from back-alley boarding houses to Skid Row dive bars, private eye Philip Marlowe has to decide how much to tell the abusive father, the father's gold-digging girlfriend, and the clueless authorities when the girl's discovered. Brick is at his best capturing Marlowe's honest concern for the hatcheck girls and the little guys that inhabit Chandler's rough 1940s L.A. world. Bask in the voice that makes noir, noir. B.P. © AudioFile 2023, Portland, Maine
Kirkus Reviews
2023-05-09
The versatile Mina adds still another arrow to her quiver in this authorized pastiche in which Raymond Chandler’s hard-boiled private eye searches for a woman who definitely doesn’t want to be found.
In fact, Marlowe’s strong impression is that wealthy LA patriarch Chadwick Montgomery III doesn’t really want to find Chrissie, his daughter and heir; he’s chosen Marlowe’s one-man agency, the narrator/hero decides, to look for her because he wants to keep the investigation under wraps and end in failure. Instead, Marlowe locates Chrissie, who was “easier to find than an optimist in a casino,” in less than a day and then has to decide what to do next. Chrissie would rather work as “Joan Baudelaire” at Peggy Zimmerman’s art gallery than return to the home of her intolerant, abusive father and his enigmatic secretary, Anneliese Lyle. The decision about her fate isn’t Marlowe’s alone, however, since the all-female detective agency headed by Anne Riordan, whom Marlowe met 83 years ago in Farewell, My Lovely, turns out to be on her trail as well. When Marlowe discovers Chrissie—who’s gone to the seedy Brody Hotel apparently to meet a nonexistent fellow named Peter West—standing over the corpse of a man who reportedly died months ago several thousand miles away, the case instantly becomes more urgent. But Mina’s pastiche, less literal than Robert B. Parker’s Poodle Springs (1989) and less glum than Benjamin Black’s The Black-Eyed Blonde (2014), is more playful in its early stages, as Mina cheekily piles on Marlowe’s trademark similes, though it darkens considerably as it approaches its fade-out.
Female-forward in all sorts of ways—quite a change of pace for the legendary gumshoe.
