London: Hamish Hamilton, 1944. First UK edition. Octavo. Original yellow cloth, titles to spine in red. With the dust jacket. Faint publisher’s stamp to rear free endpaper verso. Spine minimally rolled, hint of shelfwear to bottom edge of boards, contents faintly toned; else a near-fine copy in the faintly soiled jacket with lightly faded spine and slight rippling to bottom of spine.

First UK edition, first impression, originally published in America in 1943. This was the fourth of Chandler’s novels featuring Philip Marlowe, in which he “becomes more cynical and world-weary, and actively misanthropic, projecting his own despair onto the state of California, and onto modern life itself” (ODNB). It was adapted into a film of the same name in 1947.

Bruccoli A4.2.a. (Item #2960)