Long-Hidden Dashiell Hammett Stories Reveal Another Side

Eddie Muller at the San Franciso Chronicle looks at the new book of stories by Dashiell Hammett.

“When Samuel Spade knocked on the door it swung open far enough to let him see the mutilated dead face of a woman.”

Read more here: http://www.kansascity.com/2013/11/21/4639400/long-hidden-dashiell-hammett-stories.html#storylink=cpy

That’s the opening line of “A Knife Will Cut for Anybody,” the thin slice of a never-completed novel that will draw readers to this collection of previously unpublished stories by Dashiell Hammett, creator of Sam Spade and the sire of modern crime fiction. For aficionados of the genre, the unearthing of new Hammett stories is akin to Christians discovering an epilogue to the New Testament.
Although “The Hunter and Other Stories” contains many revelations, few of them — the above line one juicy exception — are of the hard-boiled variety that forged Hammett’s reputation.

In fact, this collection, compiled and edited by Hammett scholars Richard Layman and Julie M. Rivett (the author’s granddaughter), presents compelling evidence that the writer longed to shed the constraints that came with that reputation. Some of these stories are among Hammett’s best, yet they were summarily rejected by editors craving more of the violent action and snappy patter that made the creator of “The Maltese Falcon” and “The Thin Man” a household name.

You can read the rest of the piece via the below link:

http://www.kansascity.com/2013/11/21/4639400/long-hidden-dashiell-hammett-stories.html 

 

Literary Legend Sam Spade Coming Back To San Francisco

Mike Aldax at the San Francisco Examiner offers a piece on a Dashiell Hammett event in San Francisco. 

You’d have to be a glutton for jail food to commit a crime in Union Square tonight.

At 6 p.m., a gaggle of brawny coppers plans to attend a private party at John’s Grill, the century-old Ellis Street restaurant, on the rumor that the “blonde satan” himself — Detective Sam Spade — has returned to The City.

But you won’t get the whole yarn.

Spade, the fictional private dick made famous by legendary San Francisco writer Dashiell Hammett, is reappearing in American literature in an unfinished story that appears in a new collection of Hammett works, some previously unpublished.

Tonight’s event at John’s Grill, a restaurant Hammett frequented in the 1920s, is a book launch for “The Hunter and Other Stories.” Attendees are expected to include current and former San Francisco cops and also “a whole paddy wagon full of reporters looking for the free cocktails and lamb chops,” said publicist Lee Housekeeper.

You can read the rest of the story via the below link:

http://www.sfexaminer.com/sanfrancisco/literary-legend-sam-spade-coming-back-to-san-francisco/Content?oid=2626411

Unearthed Dashiell Hammett Tales Sparce But Riveting

Steve Stephens at the Columbus Dispatch offers a review of the new collection of stories from the late crime writer Dashiell Hammett.

“So I shot him.”

Who else but Dashiell Hammett could pull off that kind of opening sentence?

The line is from The Cure, one of 21 Hammett short stories and movie treatments collected in the newly released The Hunter and Other Stories.

Some of the best of the lot — The Cure, Faith, On the Way — have been previously published but never before included in a Hammett collection.

The rest of the hard-boiled stories, gleaned from his personal archives, have not previously seen print. A reader will soon understand why. Several are quite thin — really nothing more than character sketches built around the narrowest of plots — but what characters Hammett sketches!

You can read the rest of the review via the below link:

http://www.dispatch.com/content/stories/life_and_entertainment/2013/11/10/1-unearthed-tales-spare-but-riveting.html

Unread Dashiell Hammett Stories To Be Released By Author's Granddaughter

The late great Dashiell Hammett is one of my favorite writers, so I was interested in reading Richard Guzman's piece in the San Bernardino County Sun on a new book of short stories by Hammett, and I look forward to reading the book.

Fans of crime novels and hard-boiled fiction are bound to know the work of Dashiell Hammett. 
 
The Maryland-born writer has been credited with creating the genre that’s defined by its gritty realism and urban settings with stories that usually center on a private investigator as the tough cynical protagonist and narrator.

Among his best-known crime novels are “The Maltese Falcon,” which was turned into a 1941 hit film starring Humphrey Bogart, and “The Thin Man,” which also became a film. Both were published in 1930.

But it’s his lesser-known work, which includes very few crime stories, that is the focus of a new book about the late author set to be released Monday by Mysterious Press-Grove/Atlantic.

Co-edited by his granddaughter Julie Rivett, “The Hunter and Other Stories” is a collection of 17 short stories and three screenplays that, until now, have either never been published or have rarely been published. The stories illustrate Hammett’s desire to be known as more than a crime writer.

You can read the rest of the piece via the below links:

http://www.sbsun.com/lifestyle/20131031/unread-dashiell-hammett-stories-to-be-released-in-book-by-authors-local-granddaughter