Raymond Chandler Books

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Generally, the Great Depression was a disastrous phenomenon. However, it was a blessing in disguise for Raymond Chandler as it prompted him to put pen to paper and kick-started something that ultimately segued into an illustrious writing career. For starters, Raymond Chandler was a US man of letters, scenarist, First World War-era soldier, and one-time journalist. The penman, whose legal name was Raymond Thornton Chandler, was born in July 1888 in Chicago upon Illinois.

Order of Philip Marlowe Series

# Read Title Published Details
1 The Big Sleep 1939 Description / Buy
2 Farewell, My Lovely 1940 Description / Buy
3 The High Window 1942 Description / Buy
4 The Lady in the Lake 1943 Description / Buy
5 The Little Sister 1949 Description / Buy
6 The Long Goodbye 1953 Description / Buy
7 Playback 1958 Description / Buy
8 Poodle Springs ( With: Robert B. Parker) 1989 Description / Buy
9 Perchance to Dream ( By: Robert B. Parker) 1991 Description / Buy
10 The Black-Eyed Blonde ( By: Benjamin Black) 2014 Description / Buy
11 Only to Sleep ( By: Lawrence Osborne) 2018 Description / Buy
12 The Goodbye Coast ( By: Joe Ide) 2022 Description / Buy
13 The Second Murderer ( By: Denise Mina) 2023 Description / Buy

Order of Philip Marlowe Collections

# Read Title Published Details
1 Trouble is My Business 1939 Description / Buy

Order of Raymond Chandler Screenplays

# Read Title Published Details
1 Double Indemnity ( With: Billy Wilder) 1944 Description / Buy
2 The Blue Dahlia 1976 Description / Buy

Order of Raymond Chandler Short Story Collections

# Read Title Published Details
1 Killer in the Rain 1935 Description / Buy
2 Five Sinister Characters 1939 Description / Buy
3 Pearls are a Nuisance 1950 Description / Buy
4 The Simple Art of Murder 1950 Description / Buy
5 Pickup on Noon Street 1957 Description / Buy
6 Smart-Aleck Kill 1958 Description / Buy
7 The Smell of Fear 1965 Description / Buy
8 The Midnight Raymond Chandler 1971 Description / Buy

Order of Raymond Chandler Non-Fiction Books

# Read Title Published Details
1 The Notebooks of Raymond Chandler 1976 Description / Buy
2 Selected Letters 1981 Description / Buy
3 The World of Raymond Chandler 2014 Description / Buy

Order of Akashic Noir Series

# Read Title Published Details
1 Brooklyn Noir ( By: Tim McLoughlin) 2004 Description / Buy
2 Havana Noir ( By: Achy Obejas) 2007 Description / Buy
3 Las Vegas Noir ( By: Jarret Keene) 2008 Description / Buy
4 Trinidad Noir ( By: Elizabeth Nunez) 2008 Description / Buy
5 Istanbul Noir ( By: Tarkan Barlas) 2008 Description / Buy
6 Paris Noir ( By: Aurélien Masson) 2008 Description / Buy
7 San Francisco Noir 2 ( By: Peter Maravelis) 2009 Description / Buy
8 Portland Noir ( By: Monica Drake) 2009 Description / Buy
9 Delhi Noir ( By: Hirsh Sawhney, Irwin Allan Sealy) 2009 Description / Buy
10 Mexico City Noir ( By: Paco Ignacio Taibo II) 2010 Description / Buy
11 Indian Country Noir ( By: Sarah Cortez) 2010 Description / Buy
12 Moscow Noir ( By: Irina Denezhkina) 2010 Description / Buy
13 Philadelphia Noir ( By: Carlin Romano) 2010 Description / Buy
14 Barcelona Noir ( By: Achy Obejas) 2011 Description / Buy
15 St. Petersburg Noir ( By: Pavel Krusanov) 2012 Description / Buy
16 Kansas City Noir ( By: Steve Paul, Kevin Prufer) 2012 Description / Buy
17 Boston Noir 2 ( By: Jaime Clarke) 2012 Description / Buy
18 Helsinki Noir ( By: James Thompson) 2014 Description / Buy
19 Tel Aviv Noir ( By: Assaf Gavron) 2014 Description / Buy
20 Chicago Noir: The Classics ( By: Joe Meno) 2015 Description / Buy
21 Zagreb Noir ( By: Nada Gaši?) 2015 Description / Buy
22 Buffalo Noir ( By: Kim Chinquee) 2015 Description / Buy
23 Marseille Noir ( By: Salim Hatubou) 2015 Description / Buy
24 Beirut Noir ( By: Abbas Beydoun) 2015 Description / Buy
25 Stockholm Noir ( By: Nathan Larson) 2016 Description / Buy
26 Rio Noir ( By: Tony Bellotto) 2016 Description / Buy
27 Brussels Noir ( By: Sara Doke) 2016 Description / Buy
28 San Juan Noir ( By: Mayra Santos-Febres) 2016 Description / Buy
29 Oakland Noir ( By: Jerry Thompson) 2017 Description / Buy
30 Montana Noir ( By: James Grady) 2017 Description / Buy
31 Buenos Aires Noir ( By: Ernesto Mallo) 2017 Description / Buy
32 São Paulo Noir ( By: Tony Bellotto) 2018 Description / Buy
33 Hong Kong Noir ( By: Susan Blumberg- Kason) 2018 Description / Buy
34 Houston Noir ( By: Gwendolyn Zepeda) 2019 Description / Buy
35 Milwaukee Noir ( By: Reed Farrel Coleman) 2019 Description / Buy
36 Nairobi Noir ( By: Peter Kimani) 2020 Description / Buy
37 Addis Ababa Noir ( By: Maaza Mengiste) 2020 Description / Buy
38 Belgrade Noir ( By: Vesna Goldsworthy) 2020 Description / Buy
39 Accra Noir ( By: Nana Brew-Hammond) 2020 Description / Buy
40 Paris Noir: The Suburbs ( By: Cloé Mehdi) 2022 Description / Buy

Order of Raymond Chandler Short Stories/Novellas

# Read Title Published Details
1 Goldfish (Short Story) 1981 Description / Buy
2 The Man Who Liked Dogs (Short Story) 1996 Description / Buy
3 Red Wind 2009 Description / Buy

Raymond Chandler Anthologies

# Read Title Published Details
1 The Mammoth Book of Private Eye Stories 1988 Description / Buy
2 Great Law and Order Stories 1990 Description / Buy
3 The Little Book of Horrors: Tiny Tales of Terror 1992 Description / Buy
4 The Oxford Book of American Detective Stories 1996 Description / Buy
5 The Oxford Book of Detective Stories 2000 Description / Buy
6 The Best American Mystery Stories of the Century 2000 Description / Buy
7 Writing Los Angeles 2002 Description / Buy
8 The Longman Anthology of Detective Fiction 2004 Description / Buy
9 Pulp Fiction - The Dames 2008 Description / Buy
10 Los Angeles Noir 2 2010 Description / Buy
11 Books to Die For 2012 Description / Buy
12 The Movie Book 2016 Description / Buy
13 Writers: Their Lives and Works 2018 Description / Buy
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The scribbler spent his early childhood in Plattsmouth upon Nebraska and later on his single mother relocated the family to England wherein Chandler schooled at the London-based Dulwich College. Chandler, who passed away in March 1959, died in La Jolla upon California. In the run-up to his death, Chandler presided over Mystery Writers of America. Chandler’s niche was mystery (notably hard-boiled sub-genre) and thriller genres.

To labor the point, circumstances triggered Raymond Chandler’s writing ambitions. The decade-long economic crisis inconvenienced many employees among the Chandler who by then worked in the oil industry, holding an executive position in an oil firm. Chandler initially wrote poems before writing narrative prose.

An autodidactic learner, Raymond Chandler studied a plot formula written by Erle Stanley Gardner. Long story short, Raymond Chandler wrote his first noteworthy work, a short story, in the early 1930s and a pulp magazine published it. In the context of writing novels, Chandler debuted in 1939. Chandler ended up writing seven novel-length books and many short stories.

Raymond Chandler is renowned for penning Philip Marlowe series. The aforementioned series is composed of eight major works. There are 228 editions of the first book in the serialized work. The first edition was originally published in February 1939, titled The Big Sleep; the book is shelved under the mystery (particularly detective and noir sub-genres), fiction, crime, and classics genres.

The central character is named Philip Marlowe. Protagonist Marlowe is a six-footer, smoker, and alcoholic private eye; Marlowe likes coffee and plays chess. Marlowe’s place of birth is Santa Rosa upon California but his age varies from one novel to another. For instance, the first book points out that he is in his early thirties. Another installment in the series, which is set nearly one and a half decades later, shows that he is in his early forties. Despite the discrepancies, Chandler once stated that Marlowe was aged 38 as of April 1951.

The turning point in Raymond Chandler’s debut, The Big Sleep, is the moment detective Philip Marlowe is recruited by a certain ailing General Sternwood who is grappling with a blackmail issue concerning his daughter, a party animal named Carmen. The ensuing story as Marlowe goes into the murky world of organized crime, travels to places strewn with corpses, and leaves dead people in his wake, is intriguing in this hard-boiled award-nominated debut.

Raymond Chandler Awards

In 1955, Raymond Chandler clinched the Edgar Award for his book named The Long Goodbye. In 2000, Chandler was posthumously nominated for the Anthony Award, in the Novel of the Century category, thanks to his 1939 book The Big Sleep. Did you know that there is an Italian literary award named after Raymond Chandler?

Raymond Chandler Books into Movies

These are the most notable film adaptations of Raymond Chandler’s work. In the 1946 film titled The Big Sleep, the starring is Humphrey Bogart who portrays Philip Marlowe. In the 1975 film titled Farewell, My Lovely, Robert Mitchum appears as Philip Marlowe. In the 1973 film The Long Goodbye, Elliot Gould acts as Marlowe’s role. In the 1969 film Marlowe, based on the Chandler’s 1949 book The Little Sister, James Garner appears as Philip Marlowe. Robert Montgomery appears as Marlowe in the 1949 film Lady in the Lake. Dick Powell is Marlowe in the 1944 film titled Murder, My Sweet.

Best Raymond Chandler Books

The Big Sleep aside, these are the other two best books in Raymond Chandler’s bibliography.

The Long Goodbye: hereby, Marlowe makes an ill-thought move when he makes acquaintance with a damnable war veteran, prompting both law enforcers and criminals to come after him.

Farewell, My Lovely: Marlowe’s involvement with a prison escapee puts him at the center of a series of murders, organized crime, and an out-and-out corrupt police force.

Other Book Series You May Like

Readers who liked Raymond Chandler’s literary series also liked these book series. In James Ellroy’s tetralogy, “L.A. Quartet” series, Los Angeles Police Department detectives are sleuthing a series of gory murders. Richard Stark’s 24-book “Parker” series features an expert robber named Parker. Chester Himes’ 9-book “Harlem Cycle” series is set in the backdrop of Harlem and features badass protagonists Coffin Ed alongside Grave Digger Jones.

When Does The Next Raymond Chandler book come out?

Raymond Chandler doesn't seem to have an upcoming book. Their newest book is The World of Raymond Chandler and was released on November, 11th 2014. It is the newest book in the Raymond Chandler Non-Fiction Books.

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