Welcome to a hard-boiled and not without noir blog with news and reviews, occasional outbursts of maniacal Autograph Hound activity, plus archival records from the forty-five year run of The Dashiell Hammett Tour. 
The Dashiell Hammett Tour
1977-2022
Arkham House Ephemera
The Classic Years 1937–1973
Death Lit
Essays and Reviews Selected from Fifty Years of Writing 1974–2024
Willeford
The Book
Tag Archives: Lillian Hellman
Hammett: Back in the Jeopardy! Saddle
Last week Jeopardy! returned with Season 42, and took me by surprise by immediately dropping a Hammett clew into the mix. S42E4 9.11.2025 — the Double Jeopardy round. Category: Writers at Rest. The $1200 clew: Lillian Hellman spoke of his … Continue reading
Hammett: A Jeopardy! One-Two Punch
Jeopardy! kind of laid off Hammett clews for while, then surprised me with a sudden two-fisted assault. S41E154 — April 10, 2025 — in the initial round offered the category Mystery Loves Company. The $1000 clew: 8 paragraphs in on … Continue reading
Hammett: When Jeopardy! Dropped the H Bomb
I’ve had this one hidden away almost all year, waiting to ease under the Xmas tree. . . . Or: Would you believe I was so daunted when I saw it that I froze solid? Dropped as if I had … Continue reading
Posted in Dash, Frisco, Lit, News
Tagged Jeopardy!, Lillian Hellman, Raymond Chandler, Senator Joseph McCarthy, Tenderloin
Hammett: The Jeopardy! Roundup
For fun I’ve been keeping track of the times Hammett or something to do with Hammett (i.e. Sam Spade or Lillian Hellman) popped up on the game show Jeopardy! Kind of a marker of the cultural zeitgeist. Now that the … Continue reading
Hammett: Working the Electronic Morgue
Speaking of the epic sale of Otto Penzler’s mystery library, you may recall that I used Evan Lewis as my man on the street covering the events, since he was interested in hunting down the auction lists and putting up … Continue reading
Posted in Dash, News
Tagged Book Collecting, Evan Lewis, John D. Squires, Lillian Hellman, Otto Penzler, Terry Zobeck
Hammett: More Zobeck v. Otto
Terry Zobeck popped in a micro review related to the sale of Otto Penzler’s mystery library a few months ago, which sucked all the oxygen out of the room for awhile. The word, from Terry: My copy of Otto Penzler’s … Continue reading
Hammett: Final Jeopardy(!)
Watching Jeopardy!, S36 E8 for 9/18/19, I roused to some attention when they did a clew featuring Lillian Hellman — but, hey, it’s only Lillian Hellman, who cares, right? Since they just did Hammett recently, I admit I was caught completely … Continue reading
Hammett: Chump Change
Evan Lewis, my de facto reporter on the ground for news of the auction of books from the Otto Penzler collection — which is to say, I’m never going to bother to follow something like that, whereas Evan is covering it like … Continue reading
Posted in Dash, News
Tagged Evan Lewis, Lillian Hellman, Otto Penzler, Red Harvest, The Big Knockover
Hammett: A Paperback for Lillian Hellman
Apparently a large chunk out of Otto Penzler’s personal collection is going on the block over the next year or two. I know this news because A) it is public information, no black cats out of the bag or anything, … Continue reading
Posted in Dash, News
Tagged Autographs, Book Collecting, Creeps by Night, Evan Lewis, Frederic Dannay, Lillian Hellman, Otto Penzler, Pru Whitfield
Hammett: Chewing Over Crime and Communism
For Xmas on the Hammett front this year, obviously grabbing a copy of The Big Book of the Continental Op is first on the list — just try stuffing that floppy behemoth of a trade paperback into the old stocking! And anyone … Continue reading
