The Little Sister by Raymond Chandler. Houghton Mifflin (1949), 249 pp.
Orfamay Quest, a doctor’s receptionist from Kansas, wants Los Angeles P. I. Philip Marlowe to find her missing brother, Orrin. Marlowe can’t quite get a read on her. Is she as naïve and straitlaced as she wants him to believe, or do her flashes of flirtatiousness signal a different person below the surface? In order to find out he takes the case and heads off to Orrin’s last address. There he meets the drunken apartment manager, Lester B. Clausen, who seems to be involved in dealing drugs. Marlowe goes to examine Orrin’s old room and has an unproductive conversation with someone calling himself George W. Hicks. He returns to speak with the manager but finds that the man has been murdered with an expertly placed ice pick. More corpses are likely to show up before Marlowe completes his investigation.
This is sometimes considered Chandler’s Hollywood novel. While it’s true that one of its main characters is a movie actress, the story has little to do the film industry. Instead, the author has created another detective yarn in the same style of his earlier books. Philip Marlowe, upright but world-weary, returns with his droll observations and funny one-liners. His narrative style is enough to keep the novel entertaining. Which is a good thing because the plot has some flaws. It’s so complicated that readers may not be able to make sense of its many revelations. Several characters turn out to have come from Cleveland, for example, but the reasons their origin generates lethal behavior remain murky. In addition, the lengthy scenes with police officers, while filled with tough-guy banter, clog the narrative and lead nowhere. Chandler fans are likely to enjoy the book anyway, but readers looking for a carefully honed mystery may be disappointed.
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THEY SHOOT HORSES, DON'T THEY?
They Shoot Horses, Don’t They? by Horace McCoy. Simon and Schuster (1935), 186 pp.
Robert Sylverten arrived in Los Angeles with the goal of becoming a movie director. Now he’s in court, mulling over the events that led to his murder conviction. The woman Robert shot was his friend and dance partner, Gloria Beatty, a disheartened and embittered film extra with a quick temper and thoughts of suicide. Pointing to the prospect of steady food and lodging for a month or more, she convinced him to join a marathon dance competition at a huge building on the Santa Monica pier. There they met Rocky Gravo, the cheerful master of ceremonies; Socks Donald, the hustling promoter; Mrs. Layden, an eccentric marathon enthusiast; and some of the dozens of other couples in the contest. Robert was prepared for a long haul, but he never imagined its conclusion.
This novella operates on two levels. It provides a detailed account of a dance marathon, the sort of show that was drawing enthusiastic crowds throughout the country in the 1930s. McCoy, who worked as a bouncer at these events, bases his descriptions on first-hand observation. They’re grim but seem completely credible. The book also serves as a metaphor of some sort. With its desperate performers struggling to stay on their feet, its unfeeling customers cheering every mishap, and its promoters exploiting everyone’s degradation for their own profit, the story may represent free enterprise at its most ferocious. Or perhaps the endless movement, with dancers going round and round but getting nowhere, symbolizes life itself. McCoy provokes additional thought by leaving open the question whether the killing can somehow be justified. If readers need further enticement, they’ll be glad to know that the book is very short and can easily be finished in two or three hours.
THE LOST SQUADRON
The Lost Squadron by Dick Grace. Grosset and Dunlap (1932), 283 pp.
Red, a veteran aviator, is participating in the final mission of Captain Gibson’s group of stunt pilots. Gibson, who owns an airfield and an array of decrepit warplanes, provides aerial action for films produced by Epic Pictures. It’s a dangerous business, and already four of the original seven fliers have died in accidents. Only three remain -- Gibson, Red and young Phil Tate. They're finishing their work on a war movie directed by arrogant and insulting Arthur de Forst. Gibson once had an acrimonious affair with the star, Nena Lafollette, currently de Forst’s wife, but his amorous aspirations are now aimed at “The Pest,” the teenaged sister of one of the dead pilots. Tensions rise with the approach of the last and most difficult stunts.
This novel, which appeared originally as a magazine serial, combines two American fascinations of the 1920s and 1930s -- aviation and the movies. Grace’s descriptions of the stunts, based on his own flying experiences, are vivid and exciting. Much like similar sequences in Tedd Thomey’s Jet Pilot (1955) and Hank Searls’ The Big X (1959), they put readers right into the cockpit. The author’s portrayal of the pilots, whom he sees trapped somewhere between love and addiction, shows why they persist in their perilous occupation. His view of the film makers suggests that the director’s callousness is replicated throughout the industry. Meanwhile, Grace’s narrator, Red, adds punch to the story by frequently using very short sentences. His opener -- “I’m wanted for murder.” -- sets the tone. Much less successful are the book’s characters and plotting. Nena and The Pest do almost nothing to carry the story forward. Maybe if Grace had beefed up their parts, he could have kept things interesting for the final half of the book. As it is, the action pretty much stops about 100 pages before the novel reaches its expected conclusion. Shortcomings aside, The Lost Squadron (and its film adaptation) should hold the interest of some modern fans of both aviation fiction and Hollywood fiction.
