I thought some noir fiction might be a nice way to round off the weekend, and this was bound with my copy of The Maltese Falcon, so it was kind of asking to be read. Alas, the book developed A Smell somewhere in the midst of The Thin Man which led me to  believe that something in it was perhaps moldering. I suspect that someone was nibbling snicky snacks and reading at some point in this book’s history.

Anyway, I tried to rise above The Smell and just enjoy the book, along with the characters. Honestly, I didn’t like it as much as The Maltese Falcon, because I just didn’t get as into the plot and characters. I’m not sure why, that’s just how it went, as these things sometimes do. I think it was Dorothy that really put me off, with all her whining and thrashing about, although Nora, to be fair, was a balancing character and a total badass.

It was actually really nice to finally read a book with a strong female lead, after all the schlock I’ve been reading, and Nora was pretty darn awesome. She had spunk and a sense of humor, and yeah sometimes she played the Dearest Wife role, but you could tell that it was tongue in cheek, and with a roll of the eyes, so it wasn’t as nauseating as it could have been.

I also found the setting of New York much less engaging, maybe because I actually know San Francisco, so in The Maltese Falcon, I kept going “oh I know where they are,” or “I’ve been there,” and it gave me something to connect with. Or perhaps it’s my deep-seated fear of New York City which causes me to feel a bit faint even when I read about it.

Demographics:

The Thin Man, by Dashiell Hammett. Published 1933, 201 pages. Fiction.