The Glass Key

by Dashiell Hammett

Ned Beaumont is a gambler and a professional troubleshooter for his friend Paul Madvig, a cheerfully corrupt political power broker who aspires to greater things. Madvig has his eyes set on none other than the daughter of Senator Ralph Bancroft Henry, the heiress to a dynasty of political purebreds. When the senator's son turns up dead, Madvig becomes the prime suspect. But if he is innocent, then which of his dozens of enemies is doing an awfully good job of framing him?
Dashiell Hammett's tour de force of crime fiction combines a bulletproof plot, authentically corrupt characters, and writing of telegraphic crispness.

Genres: Mystery, Fiction, Crime, Noir, Classics, Detective, Mystery Thriller

214 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1931

About the author

Also wrote as Peter Collinson, Daghull Hammett, Samuel Dashiell, Mary Jane Hammett

Dashiell Hammett, an American, wrote highly acclaimed detective fiction, including The Maltese Falcon (1930) and The Thin Man (1934).

Samuel Dashiell Hammett authored hardboiled novels and short stories. He created Sam Spade (The Maltese Falcon), Nick and Nora Charles (The Thin Man), and the Continental Op (Red Harvest and The Dain Curse) among the enduring characters. In addition to the significant influence his novels and stories had on film, Hammett "is now widely regarded as one of the finest mystery writers of all time" and was called, in his obituary in the New York Times, "the dean of the... 'hard-boiled' school of detective fiction."

See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dashiell...

Reviews

[Anne · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ned Beaumont.
Not just Ned. Ned Beaumont.
The biggest mystery in the book isn't who killed Taylor Henry, it's why Hammett felt the need to type out Ned's full name every time he referred to him. <--but I gotta admit, it really added a bit of pizazz to the story.



You really don't know much about him other than he's a boozy gambler that showed up a year or so before the murder happened, was at an unexplained low point in his life, and was taken in by and helps run the rackets of his now best friend, Paul Madvig.
Who and what is Paul Madvig?
Paul runs the city in some sort of mobish political way. Whether he was running for something or just helping the senator run for office, I really couldn't tell you. He was crooked, yes, but in an almost likable way. And it made it a bit easier to see why Ned didn't just hit the road and let him fend for himself.
Even though most of his problems were brought about by his own stupidity all while willfully ignoring Ned's fantastic advice.
Especially about his taste in women.



Yeah. So Paul is 'in love' with Janet Henry (daughter to the senator he's trying to get elected) even though it's pretty obvious to anyone with eyes that Janet thinks he's something she should be scraping off the bottom of her shoe.



Ok. Now get this: Paul's daughter and Janet's brother had a thing. And Paul did NOT approve.
So, when Ned (Ned Beaumont) stumbles on Taylor's dead body, he sets out to keep his friend from becoming entangled in the fallout.
It's a twisty-turny tale with sleazy politicians, corrupt cops, beautiful women, and lovable crooks.
And friendship worth taking a punch for!



I never thought I'd say this, but I'm kinda hooked on these old hardboiled detective stories now.
Recommended.

[John Culuris · Rating 5 out of 5]

.
★ ★ ★ ★ 1/2

I’d read The Glass Key years--maybe decades--ago and I didn’t remember any of it. I made the mistake of taking this to mean bad. I felt justified. I remember entire stretches of Red Harvest and The Thin Man. (The Maltese Falcon doesn’t count as it is the novel I’ve reread more than any other--by a wide margin.) When in a message board review for a different book I grouped The Glass Key among Hammett’s lesser works, I was promptly called out on it. I couldn’t argue. I didn’t want to argue. When more than one person has more information than you, particularly if it contradicts your position, the correct response is to look into it. I finally did.

I think the reason my memory lapsed (aside from the fact that that’s what memories do, given enough time) is that the story is built on a couple of unsubstantial cornerstones. Ned Beaumont, unlike most Hammett protagonist, is not a private detective. What is he, then? Well, it is quickly established that he is a gambler. Beyond that, his place in this world is murky. He seems to be a confidant and advisor to Paul Madvig, the man behind the local power structure. But it’s not an official position. And yet in the opening chapter Beaumont borrows a substantial amount of money from Madvig, who reaches into his pocket without hesitation. And then there’s the question of where The Glass Key takes place? Apparently in a big town or small city somewhere in the northeastern United States; it’s a day away from New York City by train, the preferred means of long distance transportation in 1931. Considering how much is made of clandestine manipulations and local politics, you would think the arena would be more clearly defined. And finally there is a murder of fluctuating consequence. It is initially used as a lever to retrieve money from a bookmaker who skipped out with Beaumont’s winnings. Thereafter it is relegated to one of several points of contention in an upcoming election. Only at the conclusion does the solution carry any importance.

You have to get deeper into the novel before you realize The Glass Key is actually about this unnamed town and the behind-the-scenes battle for its control. It’s as if Hammett had taken the corruption-filled “Poisonville” of Red Harvest and decided to examine it from the other side. But this town is not quite that far gone. It is well on the way, however, which is probably why Paul Madvig is often mistakenly referred to as a Crime Boss--read gangster--by readers. Oh, he’s a criminal all right; but more of a powerbroker, a chess master, and, yes, he is completely apathetic to those caught in the gears of his political machine. But he never orders murder. His opponent in the coming election, Shad O’Rory--also an underground operator--is much more of a racketeer. He has no qualms in ordering the severe beating of Ned Beaumont. And he is always accompanied by thugs where Paul Madvig walks the streets unattended.

The murder instigates all the actions that follow without having any immediate impact on the principals. This is mildly surprising because Madvig has aligned himself with a senator also seeking election, and it’s his son who is murdered. Madvig is also smitten the senator’s daughter. It is his focus on activities above his station that allows O’Rory to make inroads from below. The Glass Key follows these skirmishes within the inner workings of this municipality. It plays out more like a noir movie from the 50s than a 1931 novel. Of course, one begot the other. And the story does eventually resolve itself with the solution of the murder.

I was wrong to consider this a lesser work. That it doesn’t fit neatly into the rest of the Hammett cannon had allowed it to slip from memory. It lacks the layered protagonists of The Maltese Falcon and The Thin Man and the unrelenting pace of Red Harvest. What it strives for--and achieves--is something more. It’s a detailed look at the legal and governmental corruption that had always, for the most part, hovered at the perimeter of Hammett’s work. The final betrayal in The Glass Key is as close to justice as this particular world is capable of delivering. It may represent the last chance this unnamed city has to keep from becoming Poisonville. It was all Hammett could do. He had seen enough real life Poisonvilles in the world around him.

[Luís · Rating 4 out of 5]

This novel is of unparalleled writing intensity. Many contemporary authors would do well to draw inspiration from him because they cannot match this great master. Dashiell Hammett doesn't give up and leads his detective through denouncing corruption, nepotism, and social inequalities in America in the 1930s. Part of the "hardboiled" movement, this novel also represents the behaviorist school. That is to say, we only know the story by what happens to the characters or what they say about it—no omniscient narrator or flashback. We will be immersed in the main character's skin and only know his truth. This truth makes the story particularly effective; many authors will use this technique. This book, therefore, marks an essential milestone in detective literature.

[Algernon (Darth Anyan) · Rating 5 out of 5]

Believed to have been the victim of a hold-up, Taylor Henry, 26, son of Senator Ralph Bancroft Henry, was found dead in China Street near the corner of Pamela Avenue at a few minutes after 10 o'clock last night [...]
Chief of Police Frederick M. Rainey immediately ordered a wholesale round-up of all suspicious characters in the city and issued a statement to the effect that no stone will be left unturned in his effort to apprehend the murderer or murderers at once.

Published back in 1931 this political crime thriller reads as fresh in 2017 as if it was written in today's climate rife with high stakes corruption, yellow press and sex scandals. Many have tried to imitate Hammet's style of narration, his hard edged dialogue and his sharp expositions but very few have succeeded. Maybe one of the reasons is that the author had actually lived and did investigative work through those troubled Prohibition years, through the rise of powerful gangsters that controlled whole cities through vice, booze and gambling, that had both the police and the politicians in their back pocket.

Paul Madvig is the poster boy of such successful crooks: self-made and ruthless, yet aspiring to become a part of the old 'aristocracy' in town by courting the Senator's beautiful daughter, Janet Henry. It all goes pear-shaped when the dame's brother is found murdered on the doorstep of Madvig's night club. Paul's friend and right hand man, a professional troubleshooter named Ned Beaumont, reluctantly gets involved in the mess, trying to clear Madvig's name and to find out who in a long list of enemies is trying to bring his boss down.

—«»—«»—«»—

I've actually read the book a few months back and didn't take a lot of notes (it's the kind of story you want to bookmark wholesale and study in a creative writing workshop). The tone is pitch perfect, the plot deviously twisted and Ned Beaumont is one of the best hardboiled leads I have read in the genre in the last years. "The Glass Key" is a classic by any metric one cares to consider. Here's a typical sample of what I'm talking about:

Ned Beaumont was tugging at the door-knob.
The apish man said, "Now there, Houdini," and with all his weight behind the blow drove his right fist into Ned Beaumont face.
Ned Beaumont was driven back against the wall. The back of his head struck the wall first, then his body crashed flat against the wall, and he slid down the wall to the floor.
Rosy-cheeked Rusty, still holding his cards at the table, said gloomily, but without emotion: "Jesus, Jeff, you'll croak him."
Jeff said: "Him?" he indicated the man at his feet by kicking him not especially hard on the thigh. "You can't croak him. He's tough. He's a tough baby. He likes this." He bent down, grasped one of the unconscious man's lapels in each hand, and dragged him to his knees. "Don't you like it, baby?" he asked and, holding Ned Beaumont up on his knees with one hand, struck his face with the other fist.

[Dave Schaafsma · Rating 4 out of 5]

So when I have, over the years, thought of the best works of Dashiell Hammett I usually think of The Maltese Falcon, or The Thin Man, but in recent years I have taken the opportunity to read a little more deeply into the Hammett canon, also reading the tough and political Red Harvest. I am told that over time Hammett began to despise most of his own work, but conceded that The Glass Key was "not so bad." I now find that many critics think of Falcon and Key as his two best works. I thought it was very good, very tightly constructed and also politically driven, informed by Hammett’s experience with gangs over the years, and like Red Harvest more “serious” in theme and tone, but I’d still lean to the lighter, zippier and more character-driven Thin Man and Falcon. Just a matter of taste, maybe.

The Glass Key is the story of a gambler and racketeer, Ned Beaumont, whose devotion to Paul Madvig, a crooked political boss, leads him to investigate the murder of a local senator's son as a potential gang war brews. Beaumont is sort of Madvig’s right hand man, his campaign manager. We don’t know much about his background and we don’t know much of his thoughts. This one is stripped down to action and description, almost entirely, which makes it stylistically interesting. For a campaign manager and gambler turned amateur detective, he can also take a punch; he’s beaten up a lot in this book by mobsters. He’s no saint; more of a scoundrel, though sometimes charming (not as charming or witty as Sam Spade, though!).

I am told that this book was the inspiration for the Coen brothers’ fine film, Miller’s Crossing and you can see it: mob war, a Gabriel Byrne character, and then, all the stuff about hats in both works.

I guess I wish the characters were a bit sassier or wittier in general than I recall from other Hammett novels, but the plot is great, really, with some (expected and well-turned) surprises. First time reading it and it is fine work, focusing on legal and government corruption. Recommended!

[Francesc · Rating 4 out of 5]

Uno de los clásicos de Dashiell Hammett. La trama y los personajes son brillantes. De lo mejor del autor.

One of the Hammett's classics. The plot and characters are brilliant. One of the best of the author.

[Φώτης Καραμπεσίνης · Rating 4 out of 5]

2η ανάγνωση μετά από 23 περίπου χρόνια. Ο αλλοτινός μου εαυτός το είχε βρει αριστούργημα και με ενθουσιασμό περίσσιο το διέ��ιδε όπου μπορούσε. Ο πρεσβύτερος, βεβαίως, αναγνωρίζει τη σημασία του, συνεχίζοντας να το θεωρεί εξαιρετικό ανάγνωσμα και ζωτικής σημασίας για την εξέλιξη του είδους. Ενθουσιασμός όμως, έχει πάψει να υφίσταται. Συνεχίζουμε...

[Katerina · Rating 4 out of 5]

Μια καλή ιστορία με γρήγορο ρυθμό γεμάτη ίντριγκες, προδοσίες, μυστικά, ψέματα και παιχνίδια εξουσίας και στη μέση όλων αυτών ένας φόνος. Μου άρεσε πάρα πολύ και διαβάζοντας ήταν σαν να διαδραματίζεται μια ταινία νουάρ με πρωταγωνιστές του Χόλιγουντ της παλιάς εποχής μπροστά στα μάτια μου!

A good, fast paced story full of intrigues, betrayals, secrets, lies and games of power and in the middle of this a murder. I liked it very much and reading it felt like watching before me scenes from a film noir with protagonists from the good old Hollywood!

[F.R. · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you’ve never seen 'Miller’s Crossing', I urge you to – without the slightest hesitation – do so now! The Coen brothers’ gangster film is not quite up there with 'The Godfather' or 'Goodfellas', but is a work of genius nevertheless. It’s a highly stylised tale of a town ruled by the mob and the relationship of the two men at the centre of it. Both Gabriel Byrne and Albert Finney are superb (indeed, there are no slouches in the entire cast), and the film is packed with fantastic moments which will remain forever in your memory. (The soundtrack is brilliant too). The Coens are variable film makers, but this is one of their Grade A efforts. So if you’ve never seen it, I order you to please stop reading this now and go out and get yourself a copy. You will thank me later.

For whatever reason – even though I clearly love the film – I’d never actually read the Dashiell Hammett novel which inspired it. Perhaps it was because I didn’t know what ‘inspired by’ actually meant. The film isn’t a straight adaptation of the book, so is that inspiration obscure and oblique, or is it blatant and obvious? The answer is very much the latter. They share a similar setting, the relationship between the two central characters, the spark of a mob war, some great dialogue and even all that stuff about the hats. (You’ll understand when you see the film.) Even if I didn’t know that this was the inspiration, I’d have spotted it almost immediately anyway.

I always dislike reading a book after I’ve seen the film, as I normally end up just comparing one to the other, but in this case it was unavoidable. However trying to judge it on its own merits, I will say that this is a thrilling read which kept this reader permanently on edge. Much like Hammett’s ‘Red Harvest’, it’s frequently difficult to work out which side the lead character is actually on – and that of course means anything can happen. The ending perhaps isn’t as clever or as affecting as it should be, but this is a classy gangster tale with suspense, great scenes and fantastic dialogue – and you can’t really ask for more than that, can you?

[Ian "Marvin" Graye · Rating 4 out of 5]

CRITIQUE:

Political Crime 1931-Style

Like "Red Harvest", "The Glass Key" is a novel about political crime (i.e., crimes of corruption, extortion and bribery committed by politicians in order to achieve and maintain government positions, or positions of authority) at the beginning of the 1930's.

The protagonist, Ned Beaumont, is closely aligned with one such politician (Paul Madvig), but his relationship starts to suffer when Madvig is accused of having murdered Taylor Henry, the son of Senator Ralph Bancroft Henry.

Despite his allegiance to Madvig, Ned sets out to assemble "proof of the truth" of the circumstances around the killing (e.g., who killed Taylor?; was it intentional, accidental or self-defence?; where are Taylor's hat and walking stick?; do they actually belong to the killer?). He doesn't care about the electoral implications for any of the suspects, or their political rivals. He's guided by his principles.


Source:

The Third Person Objective Perspective

As with "The Maltese Falcon", Hammett writes from the third person objective point of view. We don't know what is going on inside anybody's mind, except to the extent that it's revealed by their appearance or their actions.

Once again, Hammett pays particular attention to the characters' eyes. At various times, Senator Henry's eyes are "shiny with malice", and Madvig's eyes are "opaque", so you can't read his soul. Opal Madwig stares with "hostile bleak eyes", twice in two pages. Mrs Mathews' "dark eyes are bright, soft, inviting". Ned's eyes peer "anxiously".

Apart from these descriptions, for much of the novel, I found the third person objective perspective a little alienating. It was as if readers were being held at arm's length from the plot and the characters. Readers are just not supplied with enough personal detail to form an allegiance to any of the characters. Too much of significance (e.g., subjective motive) is concealed. You are just being carried along by the plot without any particular, subjective insight into where and why.

An Honest Plebeian Topples an Imperious Aristocrat

Perhaps because of his power and authority, Senator Henry is described as "one of the few aristocrats left in American politics. And his daughter's (Janet's) an aristocrat. That's why I'm warning you to sew your shirt on when you go to see them, or you'll come away without it, because to them you're a lower form of animal life and none of the rules apply."

Once Ned has seen more of him at close quarters, he realises that (like Donald Trump would later be) the Senator "was a man all his life used to winning without much trouble and that in a hole he'd either lose his head or turn wolf."

Eventually, the high-hatted Senator discovers that the key to congressional power that he holds is only a glass key that is capable of shattering in the lock (rather than opening the door). Decades of privilege collapse under pressure of the truth, and his patrician family falls apart.

Ned's non-aristocratic virtues are so credible and potent, that he eventually supersedes the Senator as a role model in the eyes of his attractive daughter, Janet. A supposedly lower form of animal life prevails over the lupine aristocrat.

This outcome was enough to overcome my reservations about Hammett's style, but I still felt I had to drop my rating of the novel one star. I wouldn't call the novel one of Hammett's best.



SOUNDTRACK:

Lupine Howl - "125"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6hLex...

Miller's Crossing (1990) - Original Theatrical Trailer

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hkJIc...

Jean-Pierre Coursodon: "A Hat Blown by the Wind"

Paul Young - "Wherever I Lay My Hat (That's My Home)"

https://youtu.be/ju_a2-Pve4g

[Metodi Markov · Rating 2 out of 5]

Не е от най-добрите кримки на Дашиъл Хамет.

Малко трудно ми беше да навляза в историята, но от средата ѝ ситуациите се заредиха една след друга и задържаха интереса ми.

Както много често се случва, политиката и криминалното са оплетени в Гордиев възел, който никой от действащите лица не желае или не може да разсече.

Моята оценка - 2,5*.

[Susan Atherly · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ned Lamont is a detective working with the Philadelphia District Attorney investigating murder and corruption in The City of Brotherly Love in 1931.

CrimeReads called this one of Dashiell Hammett's best Noir novels and were they ever right. I thoroughly enjoyed it from start to finish.

[Kirk · Rating 5 out of 5]

As many reviewers note, Hammett claimed this book was his favorite, and it's easy to see why. Structurally it's the most cohesive of his five novels. RED HARVEST is great but feels a little serial-y, DAIN CURSE is four stories glommed together, and both MALTESE FALCON and THIN MAN have some rather gaping plot holes that you gotta asphalt over to get to the end. But GLASS KEY feels coherent and cohesive and let's just add crisp to make an alliterative hat trick. Maybe what's most interesting is the way the Ham embeds the serial cliffhangers within the larger plot---it's what makes the book feel less improvised than HARVEST. On top of this, the characters are shady and fun, in part because Ned Beaumont isn't a PI but a political fixer working a Baltimore machine boss. Read a few books on Hammett and Baltimore and you'll appreciate how he adapted a lot of real-life Democratic frame-ups and backstabs into the narrative. Some of Ned's dirty tricks will seem almost quaint in this CSI era where crimefighters get so tediously forensic they can track displaced air particles. I especially chuckled at the scene where Ned plants a hat in a rival's living room and then plays him like Play-Do. I also like how the book never gets too specific about ideology. We never really see what bossman Paul Madvig's agenda is, other than money and power. There are some faults: Hammett's women come in two varieties, either doe-eyed bambinos or hardened vixens. The broad here, Janet Henry, is a wet noodle and makes you long for the snappy patter of Effie Perrine. Still, I find Chandler's women more interesting---they're not so breathy and whiny as Hammett's. (Though they're better in his stories). Plus the whole significance of the title is a red herring. Hammett came up with the glass key because his editor at Black Mask was pushing him for a title to publicize his forthcoming serial and then he had to work it into the actual plot. And it feels worked in, trust me. Still, that hasn't stopped critics from getting all symbolical. I especially like when folks go Freudian, as when a guy writes Ned represents "a phallic aggression perpetually destroyed by the invasiveness of its masterful gestures"---because, you know, you stick a key in a hole and sometimes it gets stuck. Well, I also thought the significance of the lambs' silence was pretty patchy, but you can't call a book "The More Buxom, the More Homicidal." Or maybe you can.

[Jamie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Reading the The Glass Key it's easy to see why Hammett was revered by Raymond Chandler and so many other hardboiled detective fiction greats of the 30's, 40's and beyond. The plot is smart, tight and doesn't slack for an instant. Hammett imbues characters with depth, giving them hidden desires, conflicting motivations and complex, shifting relationships.

The Glass Key is a murder mystery with deep political undertones, set in a city rife with corruption, crooked politicians and shady characters. The uncertain relationships, particularly between bigwig Madvig and protagonist gambler/amateur detective Beaumont, as well as an unknown agitator who attempts to provoke conflict by sending scathing, anonymous letters, allow Hammett to constantly stir the pot and defy expectations.

Despite having been published nearly 90 years ago, the story holds up incredibly well today. Highly recommended to crime fiction fans!

[Madeline · Rating 1 out of 5]

This is on The List? Really? I mean, I understand why The Maltese Falcon and The Thin Man are on there, because they're great, but as far as I'm concerned there was no reason to include this one as well.

Plainly put, it was dull and confusing. It's more political thriller than detective novel, so if that's your thing you might like this, but any sort of political intrigue drama generally bores me to death unless it's actually a historical political intrigue. There were too many characters introduced too quickly who would then disappear for large sections of the story, making it very difficult to remember who everyone was and why they didn't like each other. The leading ladies are boring as hell (no smartass Nora Charles or evil Brigid O'Shaunessy here; just a hysterical gang moll, a dull gangster's daughter, and a duller politician's daughter, and none of them are even mildly scheming or sassy) and the detective's romantic interest in one of them doesn't make a damn lick of sense. The amateur detective in question is Ned Beaumont, and it's clear that Hammett was going for one of his hard-boiled-yet-charming detective scoundrels, a la Sam Spade or Nick Charles, but the problem is that the charming bad boy is a very sensitive and specific formula, and something was improperly measured when Hammett made Beaumont. Rather than being hard-boiled, he's just an asshole, and all his quips are more smug than funny. I never understood his thought process or motivation, much less why everyone kept talking about what a swell guy he was when clearly he was just a crafty douchebag.

The murder victim that the case centers around never gets to make an appearance in the story - we meet him when his body is discovered - and so the death Beaumont is investigating never really seems that important, and the twists and turns that the story took left me mostly perplexed because I never knew what was going on in the first place anyway. It got to the point where I seriously considered just abandoning the book and reading something else, which is not good - I didn't even care who had murdered the guy, because I didn't care about him or any of the people who might have killed him, and I certainly didn't like Beaumont enough to want him to crack the case and get the dame and all that.

In a word: boring. Once again, The List has seriously dropped the ball.

[Paul Ataua · Rating 3 out of 5]

Paul Magvid’s political aspirations are in the balance when his future brother-in-law is killed and the attention focuses on him. Ned Beaumont needs to discover who is trying to frame Magvid. It’s solid Hammet detective fiction that successfully brings out the corruption in politics while sticking to a fairly tight plot. To tell the truth, while recognizing all the good things about Hammet’s writing, I lost interest as the story progressed. It didn’t grip me like other works of him have. Ok, but just OK.

[Carla Remy · Rating 5 out of 5]

10/2010

I didn't like this as much as "The Dain Curse" and his other novels, but by the end it had a fascination I couldn't deny. The beginning, the set up, was very abrupt, almost to the point of being confusing. But I like abruptness, so I can't really complain. Incredibly well-written of course.

[David · Rating 5 out of 5]

'The Glass Key' makes for a rather unusual reading experience - mainly because it's quite possible that, through large chunks of it, you may be both riveted and simultaneously wondering just what the hell is going on. The effect is akin to landing in a spider's web, where everything is connected but it's still spinning off, in a sticky fashion, in every direction. 

I've read a good amount of Hammett's work and found this novel to be the most challenging - but patience brings a satisfying payoff. As you have passed through the intrigue and get nearer to the conclusion, patches of the narrative's fog break off and dissipate. 

I'm guessing it could be the amount of sheer murkiness (the cumulative who's-doing-what-to-whom-and-why) that pleased Hammett himself; apparently this was his own favorite among his works. But, in a way, it's not so much that it's murky. It's just that there's a lot going on - with a large cast of characters - and it seems presumed that the reader can keep up.

~ and, to a degree, you may be floating along just fine. I mean, this is largely just a bunch of bad guys being bad, or duplicitous, or just not being particularly forthcoming. Occasionally a character is just outright lying. So confusion can even set in among the players.:

"I'm sure I don't know," she said, pouting. "I thought it was going to be fun when Hal asked me if I wanted to come up here with him and Opal. And then, when we got here, we found these--" she paused a moment--said, "friends of Hal's," with poorly concealed dubiety--and went on: "here and everybody's been sitting around hinting at some secret they've all got between them that I don't know anything about and it's been unbearably stupid. Opal's been as bad as the rest."

Plowing through this swamp of sideline corruption in politics is fixer / neophyte sleuth Ned Beaumont, blasé and cynical if not quite as elegantly cagey as Hammett's Nick Charles or The Continental Op. Ned can still sometimes step up to the world-weary plate.:

"Who found me? and where?"
"A copper found you crawling on all fours up the middle of Colman Street at three in the morning leaving a trail of blood behind you."
"I think of funny things to do," Ned Beaumont said.

Writing about Hammett, Raymond Chandler remarked, "He was spare, frugal, hard-boiled, but he did over and over again what only the best writers can ever do at all. He wrote scenes that seemed never to have been written before." This is especially true and on-parade in 'The Glass Key'. You may at times feel as irked or as relatively clueless as the proverbial fly-on-the-wall. But you'll also know that you're in the confident hands of a master at the top of his gumshoe game. 

This could easily be a case where an eventual second reading could reap particular rewards.

[Eliasdgian · Rating 4 out of 5]

Η Αμερική της ποτοαπαγόρευσης, το οργανωμένο έγκλημα και η διαφθορά σ' ένα από τα αρχετυπικά μυθιστορήματα της αμερικανικής αστυνομικής λογοτεχνίας. Από τον γενάρχη του είδους (και πολιτικό ακτιβιστή) Samuel Dashiell Hammett. Respect.

[Simon · Rating 5 out of 5]

This murder mystery follows a gambler's attempt to clear the name of a hopelessly corrupt politician he's allied with, when said politician is accused of murdering the local senator's son. I must say that I can definitely understand both why Hammett himself considered "The Glass Key" his masterpiece and why many modern-day readers don't enjoy it as much as for example "Red Harvest".

One of the things I liked best might turn off other readers: None of the characters are very admirable, most are frequently unpleasant, but even the bad guys' minor henchmen come across as believable humans where you can understand why they make the decisions they do. The protagonist Ned Beaumont is also far less noble a figure than the Continental Op or Sam Spade (let alone Philip Marlowe), but I still ended up rooting for him and finding him more interesting a protagonist than he would have been in the hands of a less talented writer. The plot gets into quite a few central ethical dilemmas to which it would be hard to imagine any easy solution. This is again something I imagine frustrates some readers, but for me that just made the story more interesting.

Something else I liked was how lived-in the depictions of San Francisco and New York in the early 1930's felt just through subtle means, making the cities as much individual characters as any of the people. If I have any complaint, it's that there were a few things in the story I might have understood better if I knew more about American politics in the 1930's.

[Bob Newman · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Sour Avocado

I woke up and reached for the Smirnoff next to the bed. Who was this dame in a black lace negligee next to me? I had no idea. Swallowed down the first of the day, threw on my wrinkled duds and alligator boots and got the hell out of there. Had to get to the office and warn McCarthy about the COW gang. They were planning a big hit soon, but I still didn’t have the full info. Cohen-O’Brien-Wong were heavy hitters, into everything from contract murder to smuggling coke. They had this town by the horns. Their beefy, blue-jean clad shooters infested the foggy streets. But who was the top banana? I’d heard a lot of bull, but reckoned the sleazy rumor-mongers didn’t know their ass from their elbow. It had to be the blue-eyed mayor, but he was too sharp to take an easy fall. I stopped off at the Orange Turnip for a couple of quick shots of rye, slurped a black coffee, slapped a raw steak onto my black eye, and walked a couple of rainy blocks to my office. Pasha Sugimoto was there, ready to roll, wearing a green t-shirt that said “Does not get along with others” and beat-up yellow sneakers. He told me, “If you don’t watch out, your life is gonna be exactly like Ned Beaumont’s in “The Glass Key. Who’d take you seriously then?” I poured myself a shot of Jim Beam. No ice around. Damn.
He continued, “That rich s.o.b. sits behind all of this chaos in town and we’ve gotta topple him. He’s framing the Hernandez mob on the east side and they’re not gonna take it. We’ve gotta move on the whole scene before all hell breaks loose in River City.”

Well folks, this is one of the original tough guy detective stories in which they almost never drink. Um….OK, maybe occasionally. The hero gets threatened, beaten up, and meets a sultry older woman, natch. Does he intend to ride off into the sunset with her? Yeah, right. Dirty city politics is at the center of things. How it all unravels is what you’re going to learn if you read “The Glass Key” whose title has almost as much to do with the story as my title has with this review. How come Humphrey Bogart never starred in this movie? Gotta send a private eye to find out, I guess. If you’re into 1930s detective novels this one’s a classic. Reach for your Mount Gay Black Barrel rum and read it or the boys from COW are gonna drill ya!

[Alex · Rating 2 out of 5]

Συμπαθές βιβλίο με κάμποσα θεματάκια. Χαρακτηριστικά με ενόχλησε η παντελής έλλειψη περιγραφής της εποχής, μιας εποχής της ποταπαγόρευσης που ο Χάμετ έζησε από την αρχή μέχρι το τέλος και ήταν ο πλέον κατάλληλος για να την αποτυπώσει στο χαρτί. Κατά τα άλλα υστερούσε κάμποσο στους διαλόγους και στις αντιδράσεις των πρωταγωνιστών που είχαν περισσότερο μελόδραμα απ'όσο θα έπρεπε, καθιστώντας τους αφύσικους στην συμπεριφορά τους, ξύλινους, οριακά φωσκολικούς και αρκετά μακριά από μια αντίστοιχη πραγματική κατάσταση.

80 χρόνια πίσω, όταν το "γυάλινο κλειδί" ήρθε στα χέρια των αναγνωστών, αναγνωστών οι οποίοι δεν είχαν επαφή με την αστυνομική λογοτεχνία πέρα από ίσως κάποιες τριβές με Κρίστι και Ντόιλ, και σίγουρα δεν ήξεραν αυτή την περσόνα του ψημένου hard-boiled ντετέκτιβ που ήρθε να ορίσει πολύ πετυχημένα ο Raymond Chandler περίπου την ίδια εποχή, σίγουρα έκανε ντόρο και άφησε εντυπώσεις. Αλλά είναι ένα βιβλίο της εποχής του, και αν κριθεί με βάση αυτήν, αποτελεί ένα ακόμα σημαντικό κομμάτι του παζλ που λέγεται crime fiction. Σήμερα όμως, τα γηρατειά του, από το στήσιμο της ιστορίας και τις απλοϊκές λύσεις που το 1931 φάνταζαν επαρκείς σε ένα κοινό με μικρές προσδοκίες μέχρι την βασική γραφή με τα ελάχιστα λογοτεχνικά τρικ, φαίνονται πολύ έντονα.

Βέβαια, κάτι μου λέει πως δεν είναι και το καλύτερο από τα 5 μυθιστορήματα που έβγαλε ο κύριος Ντάσιελ οπότε κάποια στιγμή εγώ και ο "πατέρας του σκληροτράχηλου Αμερικάνου ντετέκτιβ" θα πρέπει να κάτσουμε να πιούμε ένα maker's mark πάνω από τον "κόκκινο θερισμό". Ας μην αποτελέσει το 2/5 ανασταλτικό παράγοντα για τον υποψήφιο αναγνώστη, το γυάλινο κλειδί προτείνεται σε κάθε έναν που θέλει να μπει βαθύτερα στα θεμέλια της αστυνομικής λογοτεχνίας και να δει πως έφτασε από τα γεννοφάσκ��α της στο σήμερα. Μην περιμένετε όμως μια πρωτοτυπία που κατ'εμέ θα έπρεπε να έχει, τότε που το είδος δεν είχε εξευρενηθεί ακόμα και πολλά σημερινά κλισέ του ζάνρα τότε δεν υπήρχαν.

[Abhishek Chandorkar · Rating 3 out of 5]

The protagonist, Ned Beaumont, is a nicely written character. His coolness, his composure, his willingness to go right in the middle of the trouble is admirable. I fail to understand however, why is he referred to by his full name every single time in the book. Also, whenever he appears in the book, he always seems to be drinking and smoking cigars. It got a bit tiresome towards the middle of the book.

The first few pages of the book are very confusing. Very little background is given and you just have to make some assumptions about what is happening and who are all these people. The mystery climax is definitely interesting and more than made up for the rest of the book. I, however, found the premise and the cause for murder of the senator's son, somewhat unrealistic.

The book lacks the X-factor, the one which keeps readers hooked and the book difficult to put down. Nevertheless, it wasn't so bad at the end. Great for a one-time read, but I don't think I'll ever re-read this book.

[Mohammed Abdikhader Firdhiye · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this for the first time which dosent have the rep of Red Harvest, The Maltese Falcon but i found it to be almost his best, great lead character in Ned Beaumont. It is really a companion piece to Red Harvest because its also set in a small town ruled by corruption and political corruption instead of outright criminal gangs. I like how matter factly Hammett explores a social ill like that one. This time there is no tough PI looking to bring down the ciminals that own the city, the local law. Ned Beaumont is an political henchman, part of the corruption that own the city and he works for a man The Op would bring down in Red Harvest for his crimes.

In a way its even more bleak worldview than in Red Harvest and darker story because the world in the book is full of crooks, political and less political regular crooks. I like that in a way because in the real world often they dont pay for their crimes. Im not talking about the actual plot of the book but the theme and characters so dont worry about Spoilers.

Naturally i prefer The Glass Key over The Maltese Falcon because its more essential Hammett story, themes.

[Jim · Rating 4 out of 5]

Dashiell Hammett's heroes are probably best known for their sang-froid. Take Ned Beaumont of The Glass Key, for instance. He will insert himself into any stramash -- even at the expense of getting himself beaten to a pulp and landing in the hospital. And all is to help his politician friend Paul Madvig, who is running for office while trying to evade a number of highly sticky crimes.

The messes in this novel multiply, until Beaumont finally finds out who killed the senator's hotheaded son and left his body lying in the street -- the same senator whose daughter Paul Madvig loved to distraction. Fingers point in all directions, but nothing deters Ned.

It took a while for me to warm up to the story, especially as most of the characters didn't really show their true colors until later. But then things get cleaned up lickety-split. One gang boss is strangled to death by his own hood while Ned looks on. The senator is discomfited by the fix in which he finds himself. And the two women who love Ned find he doesn't much care for either one of them.

Hammett is always worth reading, even if this isn't his best book.

[Kim · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Glass Key is a novel by Dashiell Hammett. First published as a serial in Black Mask magazine no, I never heard of it, in 1930, it then was collected in 1931. Which I assume means that is when we got to read it all together in one book form. It isn't that long so it shouldn't have taken long to collect it. In this book it is impossible to cheer for the good guy because there isn't one. Ned Beaumont is our main character, but he isn't good, he is best friends with and works for the criminal political boss Paul Madvig. Paul Madvig isn't good because of that criminal political stuff he's involved in. Not only does Ned Beaumont work for him but so does half the town including police, lawyers, and judges. As for the politicians I'm not sure if they work for the bad guys or if the bad guys work for them, it's all the same anyway. The other half the town works for the other main bad guy, including police, lawyers, and judges. And the women aren't any better, I'm not sure why I would expect them to be. The one lady spends all her time sending anonymous letters to every one telling them Paul Madvig is a murderer, his daughter spends her time telling the newspapers he is a murderer, another lady tells Ned Beaumont she is calling the police because her boyfriend left her (she has a whole lot of bad stuff he left behind to give the police), then when he calls the police she gets angry at him, warns her boyfriend, and Ned ends up being beat up. And the last lady, the last one I can think of anyway, kisses Ned and makes sure her husband sees her, then when her husband commits suicide blames Ned for it. And so many people are murdered I keep losing track of who is blaming who for which murder or why they are being murdered. When they all get around to talking about the first murder, the senator's son's murder I had forgot all about him.

So, did you get all that? And I did all that without one spoiler. No one knows reading this who is dead and who isn't from me, that will probably include me the next time I come across this book and wonder if I should read it again or not. And if I don't think too much of how awful everyone is, I find that I liked the book, it was fun. It wasn't a very long book and I usually like long books, but I guess if it would have gone much longer everyone would have been dead. On to the next book.

[Mark · Rating 3 out of 5]

When are we getting those half-stars, again? I so wanted to give this 3 1/2 stars, simply on the strength of the noir prose. These were the days when men wore hats, women called them louses, everyone drank and smoked all day and goons beat up patsies and called them pals later.

This was extolled to me as one of Hammett's masterpieces, but I found a couple major flaws that I can't explain without issuing a SPOILER ALERT, so be forewarned.

Our protagonist is Ned Beaumont, a jack of all trades working for his friend and boss, political chieftan Paul Madvig. Madvig has allied himself with patrician Sen. Ralph Henry to win the upcoming election, and early in the book, Henry's hotheaded son, Taylor,is found dead on the street by Beaumont.

I won't give away the perpetrator or even all the plot twists, but two of them bothered me greatly, even trying to allow for differences in mores and literary styles over the past 80 years.

At one point in the book, Beaumont has a spat with Madvig and seemingly defects to Madvig's political rival, Shad O'Rory. When Beaumont won't cut a deal with O'Rory, he is mercilessly pummeled by O'Rory's thugs, until he eventually escapes and makes it to a hospital. What Beaumont was trying to gain by this little trip and why he put himself in a position to be repeatedly brutalized is never made clear -- if he expected to extract inside info from O'Rory, why would he refuse to cut a deal when he knew the likely consequences? -- and it remained a deep flaw in the plot. You could almost see Hammett writing this scene for the movie action, but it violated common sense.

Worse, at the end of the book, Beaumont falls for the senator's statuesque daughter (remember, all the beauties in noir are statuesque) and prepares to go off with her. Reason? Who knows. No basis for their attraction is ever made clear, especially when Beaumont knows that she despised his friend Madvig, who had hoped to marry her.

So while the mystery itself is well done and the pages are steeped in atmosphere, the basics had some holes big enough to drive a bootleg booze truck through.

[Tim Schneider · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a re-read. And a relatively recent one at that. Interestingly, I did almost a 180 degree turn on how I felt about the book in a little less than two years. Legend has it that this was Hammett's favorite of the novels he wrote. Now I can see why.

There's little doubt that Hammett not only set the stage, but really invented the hard-boiled detective with The Continental Op and Sam Spade. Yeah, John Carrol Daly was earlier. But he was a dreadful writer. And his work wasn't particularly influential, whereas Hammett's clearly was.

I think, however, that with Ned Beaumont and The Glass Key, Hammett really set the stage for the type of literary noir that has a morally ambiguous protagonist who isn't really in control of events. The Glass Key clearly sets the stage for James M. Cain, Jim Thompson and the "Gold Medal" noir writers.

This isn't the Op. It isn't Spade. It's dirtier and nastier and Beaumont is much harder and weaker and further from the heroic protagonist than either. The characters are defined by their actions, not their thoughts. And it's a hell of a ride.

[Nadin Doughem · Rating 2 out of 5]

في الصفحة الأخيرة من الكتاب يقول الناقد الأدبي في ملحق جريدة التايمس أن داشيل هاميت ارتقى بالحبكة القصصية في هذه القصة إلى مستوى لم يسبقه ولم يصل إليه أحد من قبل أو من بعد! نعم لقد صنع ذلك على شكل مغاير فلقد إنفرد ولكنه إنفرد بالحبكة حيث انه لا مبررات للأفعال ولا ترابط للأحداث ولا تسلسل مبرر لكل فصل والآخر. أحداث مجردة تحدث ولا تبرير لها وبدون شرح أو تفسير. رغم انها جذبتني في أولى صفحاتها إلا انني أرهقت في إنهائها لكم الملل وتغيب الإثارة عن رواية المفترض أن تكون مثيرة ومحبوكة ببراعة. أعياني كذلك أن ردود أفعال الأبطال مريب للغاية، فتجدهم لا يتأثرون لوجود جثة هامدة ملقاة في الشارع وتجد البطل "نيد بومينت" -الذي أرهقنا الكاتب بذكر اسمه بالكامل في كل مرة- ان يجدها فيتركها ويذهب إلى النادي ويطلب في برود ان يتحدث إلى رئيسه ويطلب منه ان يطلب الشرطة! وكذلك هذا البطل تجده يتصرف تصرفات خرقاء برغم ان الكاتب يحاول جاهدا دون جدوى ان يرسمه في صورة الرجل البارع الذكي السياسي المخضرم.

وأما عن اسم الرواية والتي جذبني في البداية فقد ظللت طوال الرواية أبحث عن هذا المفتاح الزجاجي ولكنني حين علمت ما هو ذلك المفتاح في -حرفياً- آخر صفحة من الكتاب، أصابني الإستياء التام من الرواية والكتاب معاً

[Nev March · Rating 5 out of 5]

The title puzzled me- it seemed a construct somewhat forced from an obscure dream mentioned in the novel until I considered the dream more closely.
The novel is a poem to the strange and oddly noble friendship between Ned and Paul who is ostensibly his employer. Populated with unforgettable characters and surprises, the plot twists in and out with early characters reappearing in new situations. A satisfying and surprising ending.
If you have not come across the objective third person point of view, this can feel curiously distant, like watching a black and white movie without the usual internal thoughts that populate the narration of modern novels.