FICTION

The Black-Eyed Blonde: A Philip Marlowe Novel

by Benjamin Black
Holt. Mar. 2014. 304p. ISBN 9780805098143. $27. F
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The titular black-eyed blonde of Black's tribute to Raymond Chandler is Philip Marlowe's new client, who wants the detective to find a missing former boyfriend. But Marlowe soon learns that the boyfriend is in the morgue, and the case grows more complicated as he searches from the mansions of the city's wealthiest families to the seediest dive bars to discover why this man is so important to his client. As the bodies pile up, Marlowe struggles to separate the lies from the truth, with some grudging help from his few friends in the police department. With perhaps fewer memorable descriptions that characterized Robert B. Parker's Marlowe novels Poodle Springs and Perchance To Dream, Black (A Death in Summer; Vengeance) does deliver a more complex and satisfying mystery than other authors have done in the past.
VERDICT This latest incarnation of Chandler's sleuth will appeal to fans of Chandler and Marlowe, but newcomers to one of the first great PIs in crime fiction will find much to enjoy here as well.
Reviewed by Dan Forrest, Western Kentucky Univ. Libs., Bowling Green , Jan 01, 2014
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