Overview

The Continental Op is a short, squat, and utterly unsentimental tank of a private detective. Miss Gabrielle Dain Leggett is young, wealthy, and a devotee of morphine and religious cults. She has an unfortunate effect on the people around her: they have a habit of dying violently. Is Gabrielle the victim of a family curse? Or is the truth about her weirder and infinitely more dangerous? The Dain Curse is one of the Continental Op's most bizarre cases and a tautly crafted masterpiece of suspense.

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Reviews

In The Dain Curse the Op returns in a more melodramatic tale involving jewel theft, drugs, and a religious cult. -- Library Journal The Op, the durable survivor, just goes about his hired business and underplays his hand before he applies the thumbscrews...unhampered by either imagination or fear. -- Kirkus Reviews There's plenty of reason to suppose that Chandler wouldn't have created Marlowe, Macdonald wouldn't have created Archer, Nebel wouldn't have created Donahue, etc., etc., etc., had Hammett not first created the Op. -- Jim Doherty Cool, tough, and hard-boiled in attitude, [Hammett's] works employ Hemingway's mood and spare, realistic dialogue in the genre of the detective story. -- The Concise Oxford Companion to American Literature Hammett's heroes are not merely tough; they often confront violence with full knowledge of its inherently corrupting potential. -- The Cambridge Guide to Literature in English Not just the first of the tough school of crime-writing but the best...Hammett saw the rotten underbelly and wanted others to see it. -- Times (London) Everything about the Leggett diamond heist indicated to the Continental Op that it was an inside job. From the stray diamond found in the yard to the eyewitness accounts of a 'strange man' casing the house, everything was just too pat. Gabrielle Dain-Leggett has enough secrets to fill a closet, and when she disappears shortly after the robbery, she becomes the Op's prime suspect. But her father, Edgar Leggett, keeps some strange company himself and has a dark side the moon would envy. Before he can solve the riddle of the diamond theft, the Continental Op must first solve the mystery of this strange family. -- Amazon.com, editorial review

Author Information

Dashiell Hammett (1894-1961) was an American author of hard-boiled detective novels and short stories. He is widely regarded as one of the finest mystery writers of all time. In addition to The Maltese Falcon, his pioneering novels include Red Harvest, The Dain Curse, The Glass Key, and the #1 New York Times bestseller The Thin Man. Richard Ferrone has recorded over 150 audiobooks including thrillers, romances, science fiction, and inspirational novels. He has earned an Audie Award and four Audie nominations, including for Best Solo Male Narrator of 2003. He was also recognized as an AudioFile Voice of the Last Century and a Rising and Shining Star. He has earned many AudioFile Earphones Awards and was named the 2011 Best Voice in Mystery and Suspense as well as the 2009 Best Voice in Science Fiction and Fantasy. A science fiction fan, he narrated Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars trilogy. He has also narrated works by James Patterson, Dashiell Hammett, Walter Mosley, John Sandford, Eric Van Lustbader, and Stuart Woods.

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