What the book was about: I’m not really sure. Something about a private eye from Chicago named Mallory, brought to Los Angeles supposedly to find some letters that the actress Rhonda Farr was being blackmailed with. The letters were from her to a hoodlum named Landrey. Somehow the blackmail turned into a kidnapping with a whole bunch of crooked cops, hoodlums and bodyguards crossing and double-crossing each other. By the end of the story, most of them get killed. Rhonda gets her letters. Mallory is injured but OK.

What I liked about the book: Not much

What I didn’t like about the book: I had only a vague idea of what was going on. Chandler likes to use a lot of slang, which is supposed to be great literature, but I find it almost impossible to keep track of anything, and it isn’t interesting enough to make me care.