Mystery & Thriller · TenseA San Francisco detective takes a case from a mysterious woman, and a search for a black statuette follows
The Maltese Falcon
A private detective is drawn into the hunt for a valuable statuette
Sam Spade is a private detective in San Francisco in partnership with Miles Archer. A woman who calls herself Miss Wonderly, actually Brigid O'Shaughnessy, hires them to follow a man. After a series of killings, Spade becomes a suspect while he is drawn into a search for a valuable black statuette that several parties are pursuing. It was serialized in five parts in Black Mask magazine from September 1929 to January 1930, and Alfred A. Knopf published it as a book in 1930.
More about this book
Who
Sam Spade, Brigid O'Shaughnessy, Joel Cairo, Casper Gutman, Wilmer Cook and Effie Perine.
World
San Francisco, with earlier events recounted in Hong Kong and Constantinople.
What makes it different
The narration describes only what characters say, do and look like, not their thoughts. Hammett drew on his years as a Pinkerton detective.
Feel
Hard-boiled and brisk.
Page count and cover shown for: Selected edition
Further reading
- The Maltese FalconWikipedia