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The Maltese Falcon

Dashiell Hammett

Start date: February 1, 2019

Finish date: February 28, 2019

Why we're reading this: Revisit the Shelf, February 2019

Previous Group Reads
Contemporary Classic Group Read, March 2012
[close] Revisit the Shelf, February 2019

Previous Group Reads
Contemporary Classic Group Read, March 2012

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What Members Thought

Mar 15, 2019 RJ - Slayer of Trolls rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: guardian-1000-read, 1001-books-read

Sam Spade, hardboiled detective, harbinger of the Great Depression although you can be sure he had a rock-solid alibi. Add a cast of profit-hungry adventurers, shifty dames, overzealous cops, and one missing valuable statuette. Pour it all into a lowball glass and drink it down straight, like a real man.

16 likes · Like · see review

Mar 13, 2018 Tom Britz rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: favorites

The Maltese Falcon is a deserved classic of Noir Detective fiction. The writing was crisp and no-nonsense and I could picture Humphrey Bogart playing this part, even though I've never seen it. . .yet. Dashiell Hammett tailored it smoothly so that Bogart was a natural for the big screen edition.
The case begins when a femme fatale comes into the offices of Spade And Archer. What starts out to be a simple case of tailing her male friend ends up with Sam Spade's partner Miles Archer being gunned dow ...more

6 likes · Like · see review

Mar 24, 2008 Terri rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: mysteries, classics, hard-boiled-noir

Most of us know the story already from the movie with Humphrey Bogart. Sam Spade is a hard boiled detective hired by a complicated woman while others searching for the same prize.

While I will say this book is very well written and I love the way Hammett describes things -- he certainly has a way with words. I liked the book a lot. However, it is complicated because I really didn't like all the characters and their myriad of lies as well as Spade's complete acceptance of all the lies he had to so ...more

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May 01, 2017 Nadine in NY Jones rated it it was ok

Shelves: oh-unlikeable-you, dick-lit, mystery, classic, 1001-books, hard-boiled, detective-mystery, noir

I didn't really love this, I found it tedious, and Sam Spade is an ass, even to his friends. I assume that must be part of his appeal, but it doesn't appeal to me. I can't help comparing this to Chandler's The Big Sleep, which I read recently. Chandler's book dazzled me. I'm clearly a Chandler gal, not a Hammett gal!

Hammet's style makes me irritable and restless. This is wordy, heavy on the descriptive. I don't care exactly what everyone looks like and what they're wearing. Every time Spade rol I didn't really love this, I found it tedious, and Sam Spade is an ass, even to his friends. I assume that must be part of his appeal, but it doesn't appeal to me. I can't help comparing this to Chandler's The Big Sleep, which I read recently. Chandler's book dazzled me. I'm clearly a Chandler gal, not a Hammett gal!

Hammet's style makes me irritable and restless. This is wordy, heavy on the descriptive. I don't care exactly what everyone looks like and what they're wearing. Every time Spade rolls a cigarette or drinks a whiskey or brandy or coffee, we read about it. In detail. My god I Do Not Care! What does it matter how many cups of coffee everyone drinks? I feel like I'm reading a movie script.

Things I had to look up:
chypre - a non-alcoholic perfume made from sandalwood with citrus top notes and mossy, woodsy undertone
Levantine - Syrian? I was unsure if there was a double meaning here that I missed.
Baumes rush - Senator Caleb H. Baumes sponsored a New York law (the Baumes Law) which called for automatic life imprisonment of any criminal convicted more than three times. Some criminals would move to a state that didn’t have this law in order to avoid its penalty should they be caught again, and this was known as a “Baumes rush,” because of the similarity to “bum’s rush.”
Romeville - I looked this up and it is thieves' slang for London, but the context of Spade's comment makes it seem like he means NYC.
Gunsel - from Yiddish gendzl (gosling), a boy kept for homosexual purposes. Per William Safire: "misunderstanding of the 1929 Maltese Falcon quotation above (which survived in a popular 1941 film adaptation). The novel was originally serialized in a magazine, Black Mask, whose editor refused to allow vulgarities. Hammett used the word gunsel knowing that the editor would likely misunderstand it as relating to gun, and therefore allow it." (Thus, gunsel is sometimes used now to mean "criminal carrying a gun.")
Gooseberry lay - tramp slang for stealing laundry from clotheslines
...more

1 like · Like · see review