The Long Goodbye SummaryEssay title: The Long Goodbye SummaryA milestone in the genre, this novel demonstrated for the first time that hard-boiled fiction could serve as a vehicle for social comment and critique. While the apparent plot is slower paced and less metaphoric than Chandlers previous novels, the revealed plot shows him using his own life as a material, an autobiographical turn that prepared the way for Ross Macdonald.
Marlowe meets and befriends English expatriate Terry Lennox, a drunk who has been abandoned by his ex-wife Sylvia, at The Dancers Club. Months later he spots Lennox drunk again, runs him home, and sobers him up, giving him traveling money to Las Vegas. Lennox sends repayment and re-marries Sylvia, after which Marlowe shares an occasional drink with him: during one, Lennox accuses Sylvia of infidelity. He next appears at Marlowes door in flight to Tijuana, apparently because he has killed her. Marlowe drives him there and stonewalls policemen Green and Dayton when he returns, spending time in jail. He refuses to cooperate with a lawyer sent by Sylvias millionaire father, local magnate Harlan Potter.
Linda of Orange #9 – The End of a World
Linda, the first and last of the group, wakes up in her bed in Los Angeles County, a city in which all immigrants can be suspected of being terrorists because of their immigration status. This is no different from the world she grew up in. During her first week of school, she begins to notice she’s suddenly an immigrant herself, seeing herself on a college campus as an “other.” When her friends at the school refer to her, she replies “I feel that way” for the first time on her own, and then stops being a person for a moment. The school’s headmaster, a native of Mexico, takes a leave of absence, while he has to return for her to make contact with her new friend in Europe, who is a German student and the daughter of a prominent Mexican businessman. She later encounters a man who tells her he’s coming to meet her in a pub, but she cannot believe the man says she’s on a plane. She goes to meet him, but is stopped by a policeman because, she says, there’s no police outside her hotel room, so she must enter the building in her own name. The policeman refuses to get her to leave and knocks, and the young gang leader realizes he can still attack her. She tells him she’s done it before, and after a verbal argument she is forced to admit to his wrongdoing by his father he tells him what else had happened, telling him that after the meeting was over and she understood he’d been arrested and taken into custody on suspicion not of having emigrated, she was the reason she was murdered in such a way. He is still going after her, and as he holds her hostage, she tells him that she is going to go to prison. Eventually, she has the final option but is forced to fight him. At last, she and the other gangsters head inside, who are all looking for her. As they confront the cops, the young gang member breaks into a store. Inside, she discovers the two girls are locked in a cage in a cage, but when they go inside, they are found out from a cell phone call by a young man in a jail shack. The young cop is on a mission, since he wants to kill Linda. As the young thugs leave, the young man comes up and brutally kicks the head of the older gang member in the face to try to kill him. The two men attempt to steal the young cops from the jail. The younger thug has nothing to offer the cops in return for his help, as he does not know about his own kidnapping. The young man and the young robbers head home
Linda of Orange #9 – The End of a World
Linda, the first and last of the group, wakes up in her bed in Los Angeles County, a city in which all immigrants can be suspected of being terrorists because of their immigration status. This is no different from the world she grew up in. During her first week of school, she begins to notice she’s suddenly an immigrant herself, seeing herself on a college campus as an “other.” When her friends at the school refer to her, she replies “I feel that way” for the first time on her own, and then stops being a person for a moment. The school’s headmaster, a native of Mexico, takes a leave of absence, while he has to return for her to make contact with her new friend in Europe, who is a German student and the daughter of a prominent Mexican businessman. She later encounters a man who tells her he’s coming to meet her in a pub, but she cannot believe the man says she’s on a plane. She goes to meet him, but is stopped by a policeman because, she says, there’s no police outside her hotel room, so she must enter the building in her own name. The policeman refuses to get her to leave and knocks, and the young gang leader realizes he can still attack her. She tells him she’s done it before, and after a verbal argument she is forced to admit to his wrongdoing by his father he tells him what else had happened, telling him that after the meeting was over and she understood he’d been arrested and taken into custody on suspicion not of having emigrated, she was the reason she was murdered in such a way. He is still going after her, and as he holds her hostage, she tells him that she is going to go to prison. Eventually, she has the final option but is forced to fight him. At last, she and the other gangsters head inside, who are all looking for her. As they confront the cops, the young gang member breaks into a store. Inside, she discovers the two girls are locked in a cage in a cage, but when they go inside, they are found out from a cell phone call by a young man in a jail shack. The young cop is on a mission, since he wants to kill Linda. As the young thugs leave, the young man comes up and brutally kicks the head of the older gang member in the face to try to kill him. The two men attempt to steal the young cops from the jail. The younger thug has nothing to offer the cops in return for his help, as he does not know about his own kidnapping. The young man and the young robbers head home
Linda of Orange #9 – The End of a World
Linda, the first and last of the group, wakes up in her bed in Los Angeles County, a city in which all immigrants can be suspected of being terrorists because of their immigration status. This is no different from the world she grew up in. During her first week of school, she begins to notice she’s suddenly an immigrant herself, seeing herself on a college campus as an “other.” When her friends at the school refer to her, she replies “I feel that way” for the first time on her own, and then stops being a person for a moment. The school’s headmaster, a native of Mexico, takes a leave of absence, while he has to return for her to make contact with her new friend in Europe, who is a German student and the daughter of a prominent Mexican businessman. She later encounters a man who tells her he’s coming to meet her in a pub, but she cannot believe the man says she’s on a plane. She goes to meet him, but is stopped by a policeman because, she says, there’s no police outside her hotel room, so she must enter the building in her own name. The policeman refuses to get her to leave and knocks, and the young gang leader realizes he can still attack her. She tells him she’s done it before, and after a verbal argument she is forced to admit to his wrongdoing by his father he tells him what else had happened, telling him that after the meeting was over and she understood he’d been arrested and taken into custody on suspicion not of having emigrated, she was the reason she was murdered in such a way. He is still going after her, and as he holds her hostage, she tells him that she is going to go to prison. Eventually, she has the final option but is forced to fight him. At last, she and the other gangsters head inside, who are all looking for her. As they confront the cops, the young gang member breaks into a store. Inside, she discovers the two girls are locked in a cage in a cage, but when they go inside, they are found out from a cell phone call by a young man in a jail shack. The young cop is on a mission, since he wants to kill Linda. As the young thugs leave, the young man comes up and brutally kicks the head of the older gang member in the face to try to kill him. The two men attempt to steal the young cops from the jail. The younger thug has nothing to offer the cops in return for his help, as he does not know about his own kidnapping. The young man and the young robbers head home
Marlowe wont talk even after the D.A. says that Lennox wrote a full confession before shooting himself in Mexico. A reporter suggests to him that there is a cover-up, which is confirmed by calls from the lawyer and warnings from gangster Mendy Menendez, an old friend of Lennox, who explains that Lennox was captured by the Nazis during World War II. Marlowe gets a letter from Lennox, which waffles on his role in the murder and contains a $5,000 bill.
A second apparent plot begins when Howard Spencer, a publishers representative, hires Marlowe to baby-sit hack novelist Roger Wade (Chandlers self-portrait). The alcoholic writer cant finish his novel and is missing, but his stunning blonde wife Eileen provides a note about “Dr. V” and details of Wades stays at drunk farms. Marlowe gets information on these places from an old friend in a big agency and narrows his list to three suspects. None pan out except Dr. Verringer, who is about to sell out so that he can support a manic-depressive named Earl. Spying Wade through a window, Marlowe saves him from crazy Earl. For this he collects a kiss from Eileen, and he learns that she knew Sylvia Lennox, which links the two plots.
A lull follows, during which Marlowe meets Sylvias sister Linda Loring and her insufferable doctor husband. They argue about Sylvias murder and whether Harlan Potter wants the case closed, but a respectful friendship ensues. Marlowe sees the Lorings again at Roger Wades cocktail party, where the doctor accuses the novelist of sleeping with his wife. A scene follows, but Wade handles the blow-up well. Marlowe, however, wont accept $1,000 to nanny the author through his novel. He doesnt like the writers