I read Dashiel Hammett’s book The Thin Man, and quite enjoyed it. Awesome story of a lovable couple casually working their way through a murder case that’s too amusing to ignore. Has some good droll observations about how people work, like the social boilerplate around saying goodbye:
We shook hands and make polite speeches all around and they went away.
Nice turns of phrase, like this bit after an underling compliments his boss:
“And what a hunch!” Flint exclaimed, practically top-heavy with admiration.
And I’m pretty sure this is one of the greatest paragraphs in the English language:
When we stopped at Reuben’s for coffee on our way home at four the next morning, Nora opened a newspaper and found a line in one of the gossip columns: “Nick Charles, former TransAmerica Detective Agency ace, on from Coast to sift the Julia Wolf murder mystery”; and when I opened my eyes and sat up in bed some six hours later Nora was shaking me and a man with a gun in his hand was standing in the bedroom doorway.
How could you read that, and not go immediately to the next chapter? I watched the movie right away, too, like I did with Gone Girl (movie, book). Both recommended.
Mark Larson 