A review by carmenghia
The Continental Op by Dashiell Hammett

3.0

I didn't realize this was a short story collection until I was halfway through the first story. I understand that the Continental Op character is the archetype for hard-boiled fiction and that Hammett wrote these stories based on his own experiences as a Pinkerton detective, but they aren't necessarily great. They feel like pulp magazine fiction and are generally straightforward 'and-then-this-happened-and-this-happened-after-that." I understand that Hammett's writing became more nuanced by the time he got around to writing Sam Spade novels but I haven't read them to compare. However, being a detective in an era of telegrams and telephone operators is a nice little time warp.