The Dashiell Hammett Tour (30th Anniversary Guidebook) - Don Herron.pdf

Expanded and revised, this 30th-anniversary edition guides readers over the fog-shrouded hills stalked by Sam Spade, the Continental Op, and other legendary characters created by San Francisco’s most famous mystery writer, Dashiell Hammett. Detailing locations of interest, including all of Hammett’s known residences and the majority of settings from The Maltese Falcon, this guidebook contains maps, self-guided tours, and photographs of Hammett-related locations from both then and now. A new preface by Jo Hammett, the detective writer’s daughter and Edgar Award–nominated writer, is also included.

Editorial Reviews
From Publishers Weekly
Hammett fans, whether or not they have taken the Dashiell Hammett walking tour that Herron has been conducting in San Francisco since 1977, will welcome this 30th anniversay edition of the guidebook. Herron has a deep reservoir of knowledge of the life of the father of the hard-boiled detective genre, as suggested by the biographical essay that constitutes part one. Part two lays out the itinerary of Herron's tours, including Burritt Street, where a plaque commemorates the first murder in The Maltese Falcon-that of Sam Spade's partner, Miles Archer. In the book's preface, Jo Hammett, Hammett's daughter, reminiscences about taking Herron's tour. The late Charles Willeford's introduction still remains relevant, though as Herron points out in an informative new afterword, Willeford garbled Herron's own biographical details. Admirers of Herron's biography of the cult crime writer, Willeford (1997), will be interested to learn that he met Willeford, whom he had never heard of before, when Willeford took the tour in 1984. Illustrated with maps and photos throughout, this volume will appeal not just to students of Hammett but to anyone curious about the relation between a writer's life and his work.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.
Review
"Hammett fans will welcome this guidebook. Illustrated with maps and photos throughout, [it] will appeal to anyone curious about the relation between a writer's life and his work." —Publishers Weekly


"Thorough and fun . . . For fans, no trip to San Francisco is complete without a copy of Herron's Dashiell Hammett Tour. Recommended." —Library Journal


“A hard-boiled stroll through the world of the American Private Eye.” —The New York Times


"Friendly, witty, articulate, theatrical, and thoroughly immersed in Hammett arcane." —Los Angeles Times


"It’s fun, fascinating, and fully illustrated with photos of appropriate sites. A gas." —San Francisco Chronicle


“Sparkling, delightful and obviously essential to anyone concerned with San Francisco’s literary history.” —The Peninsula Times Tribune


"Combines Herron's encyclopedic knowledge . . . with a rapid-fire dispensation of history, anecdotes, and passages from books, all delivered in a tone and manner befitting a pulp story by Hammett himself." —San Francisco Examiner


"A delightful, informative, and capsulated biography of Dashiell Hammett, and a walking tour, or auto tour, of San Francisco." —Mostly Murder
--This text refers to the Hardcover edition.