The Lady in the Lake

By Raymond Chandler

In his fourth novel appearance, private investigator Philip Marlowe is hired to find a businessman’s estranged wife, but instead finds a series of dead bodies and crooked cops. Although Chandler himself adapted the novel into a screenplay, it has never been used. The novel was filmed by Robert Montgomery, using a different, shorter script.
 
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• Language: English
• Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
• Release date: Apr 19, 2016
• ISBN: 9781551998701

Raymond Chandler

Raymond Chandler (1888-1959) was best known as the creator of fictional detective Philip Marlowe. One of the most influential American authors of crime novels and stories, his books were considered classics of the genre, and many of them were turned into enormously popular Hollywood films, including The Big Sleep and The Long Goodbye.

Reviews for The Lady in the Lake

[comfypants · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

A private detective looks for a woman and finds some bodies.3/4 (Good).Marlowe isn't as persistently amusing as he is in his first few novels. He has his moments, but mostly the book is allowed to focus on the plot, which is never Chandler's strength.

[mrgan-2 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

At his best, Chandler is giddily, addictively good at description and turn of phrase. Any writer will walk away from a Chandler page wishing, at least a little bit, they'd thought of that way to put that.

But at his Worst, Chandler overplots his books to a frustrating degree. If only he'd abandoned the notion of having a "clever mystery" here. The setup is interesting because of the characters and because of Marlowe's view of the world, not because the story is so knotty and in-credible that the eventual resolution requires a hundred wonky parts to move together.

[copyedit52 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

The first Chandler I read, and afterward I methodically read all the others, often more than once. So this has to get five stars, if only for sentimental reasons.

[matthew.ducmanas · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I'll return to Chandler's novels again and again. His prose and the hard-boiled world-weariness of Marlowe go down as smoothly as a good bourbon. Lady in the Lake is a good example of a Chandler plot that ends up being a bit convoluted, yet somehow, Chandler still manages to keep it grounded and believable.

[milboy_1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

A lady whose name is Crystal didn't come back.Where is she?A detective tried to find her. But he found other people dead who had been related with her.what's happened?I was interested in the introduction.So I chose to read this book.But there are too many characters in this book.It was difficult for me to memorize their names.And the ending was complicated.I'm unsatisfied with it.

[felius_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

The first "noir" book I've read. I quite enjoyed it! Chandler's writing puts you right in Marlowe's head, which is an interesting place to be. Short, economical sentences combine with vivid - almost poetic - imagery, matching Marlowe's rough surface and surprising depth. The plot was pleasantly tangled - enough to keep you on your toes, but not so much that you stop caring.I think I might have to track down some more of this and give it a go.

[alexrichman_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Some silly twists, but they probably help to make this such a compelling, cinematic story with a strong supporting cast.

[rose_p_10 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

The High Window, The Lady in the Lake, The Little Sister - I got hooked into the Big Sleep right at the end of March, then lashed out in Waterstones to buy a three-in-one compendium and whomped my way through it in a weekend. They aren't works of literary genius, but they are well-plotted and stylish who/why dunnits. And though I can't do accents in real life, inside my head I was reading in an American drawl, with pictures in stylish black-and-white and a sleazy sax in the background. I thought I'd grown out of detectives/crime but these are thoroughly good reads and I'd recommend them to anyone.

[mcolv9890 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

It's known mostly for its great use of metaphor. The cowboy character that crops up at the end is one of Chandler's finest creations. This is a damn fine read and falls just below The Long Goodbye and The Big Sleep.

[tomoyoh_3 · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

I have been intersted in police and detective since I was a child .The work of detective is certainly very hard and dangerous .But after reading this , I thought more and more detective is very important .And I also think I want to save people like them .

[hexum2600 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A solid Marlowe novel despite having a couple parts of the resolution I wasn't a fan of.

[bcquinnsmom · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Cutting right to the chase, the fourth novel in Chandler's Marlowe series begins with a missing wife. Degrace Kingsley, a businessman in the perfume business, hires Marlowe to find his wife Crystal. Although they'd been "washed up for years," Kingsley needs Marlowe to find her to make sure she hasn't done anything scandalous to reflect back on him. The last time he knew Crystal's actual whereabouts was a month earlier, when she was staying at their cabin up at at Little Fawn Lake at Puma Point. Marlowe travels there, meets Kingsley's alcoholic caretaker, Bill Chess, whose wife has also disappeared. Not a believer in coincidence, Marlowe decides that he needs to look into both cases, and finds a lot more than he expected.Things in Los Angeles have changed a bit since the time of The High Window. Chandler makes a number of references to the war starting with the very first sentence of the novel, as a sidewalk in front of Kingsley's office building, made of "black and white rubber blocks" is being dismantled to go the government. Later, he notes that armed sentries are standing guard at the dam at Puma (read Big Bear) Lake, "at each end and one in the middle." Marlowe runs into a woman who walked to her destination to save her tires for the government. Men are waiting to hear about their enlistment. At the same time, some things have remained the same: crooked cops, murder, blackmail, illegal gambling and drugs are still in action in the city. There's another big difference in this book that sets it apart as well -- a good deal of action takes place away from LA, up in the mountains where life is much slower, where deer walk unimpeded, where people are actually nice, and where rudeness is conspicuous and not appreciated. It's an entirely different world, just a few hours' drive from the city.The Lady in the Lake is quite intriguing, and although isn't my favorite of the Marlowe novels so far, Chandler is still very much on top of his game here. The same wisecracks and witty turns of phrase are still in play. Marlowe continues to try to hold on to his own moral compass while having to resort to less than ethical means to find the bad guys. And while there is a basic formula shared by all of these novels -- Marlowe being hired, Marlowe bumping into peripheral cases that somehow tie to his own investigations and get him into some sort of trouble -- each book is different in its own way. Normally when crime novels get formulaic I get bored. For some reason, that's just not the case with these books -- between Chandler's writing, his focus not just on Marlowe but the other characters as well, and the way he describes Marlowe's Los Angeles, I can't get enough.

[booksfordinner · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Classic crime noir fun. No wondering what anyone is thinking in a book like this!

[shanaqui_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This might've been my favourite so far, and that might be because I managed to figure it out before Chandler got there. I like feeling smart, and after he lost me plenty of times in the other books, I got pleased with myself for following this one just fine. The plotting was tighter, or at least, more comprehensible, and it didn't seem to inexplicably wander quite so much.

As always, though, in my opinion the writing was the stronger part -- and the characterisation, of course: mostly that of Marlowe. His dialogue and the first person narrative see to that. The writing/dialogue isn't so stunning now I know what to expect from Chandler, but it's still good. The whole exchange about 'whom' made me laugh: "Did he say whom?"/"Yeah, but don't hit him. There is such a word."/"I knew there was. I often wondered where they kept it."

A couple more to go. I'll be sad when I run out of Chandler.

[leischen_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Hired to find a rich man's missing wife, Marlowe starts the case by finding the body of a different missing wife. Hard boiled classic with the trademark Marlowe cracks.

[stahl2ricco · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Another great read from Raymond Chandler! Five pages in and I was hooked and addicted! This story moves fast - once the body is found in the lake, the search intensifies! And with poor alibis, confused identities, and a dedicated Marlowe hot on the trail, the action is whip snap! I love the way Chandler writes, and a sentence like, "I gobbled what they called the regular dinner, drank a brandy to sit on its chest and hold it down, and went out on the main street.", just leaves me in awe of his writing. I'm so glad I haven't read every one of his books - yet!

[mducman-1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I'll return to Chandler's novels again and again. His prose and the hard-boiled world-weariness of Marlowe go down as smoothly as a good bourbon. Lady in the Lake is a good example of a Chandler plot that ends up being a bit convoluted, yet somehow, Chandler still manages to keep it grounded and believable.

[auntieknickers · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

This is the second Chandler novel I've read. I found it more satisfying than [book: The Long Goodbye] -- although it's just occurred to me that there's a major plot point that is very similar in the two books. Chandler's wise-cracking private eye, Philip Marlowe, is hired to investigate the disappearance of a rich man's wife. When a woman turns up dead in the lake near the rich man's mountain cottage, the case seems on its way to a solution. But Marlowe keeps investigating, finding more bodies, dealing with corrupt and violent police, and at last coming to the true solution. Reading this at the same time as the Katherine Hall Page books I recently reviewed engendered some ruminations on the differences between the "cozy" traditional mystery, much scorned by Chandler, and the "hard-boiled" and sometimes noir private-eye series like Chandler's, Hammett's, and John D. MacDonald's. My conclusion is that it's the latter that is really the "escapist" fiction, more so than the "cozy" (a term "cozy" writers hate). Marlowe and his ilk lead lives very different from those of most of their readers. In [book: The Lady in the Lake] Marlowe never even seems to sleep, much less have to deal with other mundane tasks, nor does he have any friends or family to care for or even relate to. The usual amateur sleuth in a traditional mystery has to hold down a job, either paid or unpaid, care for family and friends, and often maintain a marriage or romance, while solving a crime. This brings to mind the line that Ginger Rogers did everything Fred Astaire did, but did it backwards and in high heels!
I read this book for the DorothyL Book Discussion, where we're reading and discussing a classic work of detective fiction every month.
I also watched the movie version of this book, which was made in 1947 starring and directed by Robert Montgomery. Don't bother. The writing (not by Chandler) is terrible and the plot has been jiggered; a completely pointless Christmas theme (original set in high summer) makes it even worse.

[donaldgallinger_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

The Lady in the Lake is one of Chandler's best. Philip Marlowe finds a body--but whose body is it? Laced with Chandler's wry commentary on everything from rich dames to down and out war veterans, this book is an absolute delight from the first page to the last. Classic Chandler. Sharp, funny, full of surprising twists, and always the most original prose around. Highest recommendation for an American "noir" novel.

[clong_818048 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Warning....spoilers ahead....DON'T READ THIS REVIEW IF YOU HAVEN'T READ THE BOOK.I like Chandler a lot...I like the atmosphere and tone of his writing. I like his dialogue; I like his descriptive language; I like Marlowe as a character; I like his characters in general. As someone who grew up in LA, I also find the setting of his novels fascinating.Having said all that, I felt like I may have enjoyed reading this book more than it really deserved. A couple of plot turns seemed too obvious and others left me scratching my head. In particular, I found the idea that Mildred Haviland would have become Muriel Chess to be entirely incongruous, and I was in retrospect baffled by Al Degarmo's actions in the final stages of the story (which made for plenty of drama, but again felt out of character).

[ruthich · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

One of Chandler's best with the usual sultry women, shady men and tragic ending

[caerulius · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Philip Marlowe, of The Big Sleep has a new case- he has to find the missing socialite wife of a perfumier... but along the way he discovers another missing woman and a string of shady characters.Reading Raymond Chandler is a lot like watching Bogart film noir (perhaps, because Bogart film noir is usually based on Chandler's books... hm). Anyway, the style is fun to read, the mystery is truly mysetrious, by which I mean you can't figure it out within the first ten pages; it really does twist and turn to the point that you figure it out about the time Marlowe does. He's not consciously oblivious the way many lit detectives can be, to make a mystery seem more complex than it really is. And as a narrator, he's first rate. Funny, dry, witty, tough, and sly.Highly recommended.

[simonaries · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Chandler in good form. The two blonds disappearing on the same day is a bit of a giveaway.

[antiquary_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Chandler is a favorite of ,mine and this story is one I like very much, though I also like the shorter stories he rewrote to create it. My favorite character is the old sheriff, called Patton in this version.

[vesper1931 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Marlowe is employed by Derace Kingsley to find his missing wife Crystal. She has been missing for a month and last seen he blieves at their cabin in Puma Point. When Marlowe visits the cabin he discovers another missing wife. The case gets more complicated from then onwards.
Another very enjoyable and well-written historical crime story. A re-read

[kurtwombat · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Chandler's Philip Marlowe is the ultimate world weary detective, here conveyed via a serpentine plot. Almost poetic descriptions and deft characterizations lift this above the genre Chandler helped create. All Chandler is good, this sets about middle of the pack for his writing. The Long Goodbye being my favorite. A Los Angeles location of swank pads of the wealthy and seedy hotels where the rick rendevous with their dark appetites and the long dark streets and usually lead through empty streets and into the hills above LA...away from the lights and the police and often morality. A missing wife leads to another missing wife that may be linked or simply not what they seem. Who we are is often not limited to the name we carry.

[dh1writer · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I figured out the ending early on. That did not make the story less enjoyable. Chandler always transports me to another time and place. His time. His place. And Marlowe. You can't go wrong.

[addunn3 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A missing woman, another found in a lake. Marlowe unravels a complicated mystery.

[carl_alves_1 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

The Lady in the Lake is a hardboiled mystery novel written and set in the forties. Private detective Phillip Marlowe has been hired by a wealthy client, whose wife has gone missing. He fears she may have gotten into trouble after sending him a wire that she was marrying another guy. His investigation finds a second woman missing, also someone’s wife. As he digs further, he finds a complicated web of entanglements.This is the first novel I’ve read from Raymond Chandler, and I didn’t much care for it. The problem I had with the novel is that I found it to be very confusing. There was a constant infusion of characters that were mostly taking place off screen, and at some point I got lost in all of the characters and details. After that happened, I couldn’t quite get back into it. I found the writing to be competent and solid, and the character of Phillip Marlowe to be an interesting one, but the actual plot didn’t meet my expectations.Carl Alves – author of Blood Street

[nyakyakyanya · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

this book was a murder story. I couldn't enjoy　reading this book, because there were too many charactor to understand the story. Things I understood ware love has a big power, jeaiousy has a horrible power. for those power, people kill other peole.