by Joe Gores
First published 1982
Dashiell Hammett has traded his Pinkerton badge for a typewriter. The former detective now struggles to make ends meet as a writer in 1920s San Francisco, where corrupt politicians control everything from Chinatown's narrow streets to the waterfront near the Golden Gate Bridge. Hammett mines the city's criminal underworld for material, turning real corruption into fictional stories. His routine changes the night someone beats his friend to death with a baseball bat. Hammett abandons his writing desk and returns to detective work. He walks back into San Francisco's violent streets, determined to track down his friend's killer. The city he once knew as a Pinkerton operative has grown more dangerous and more corrupt. Hammett must navigate the same criminal networks he now writes about, but this time the stakes are personal.
Genres: american-fiction, historical-fiction, 20th-century, mystery, crime, detective
Vibes: atmospheric, dark, suspenseful
Tropes: amateur-sleuth, former-detective
Setting: Chinatown, Golden Gate Bridge, San Francisco
Period: 1920s
Paperback · HarperCollins (paper)
Content warnings: violence