Part II: It was a dark and stormy night...

...I sat at my desk and nursed a bottle of bonded rye. Hearing the door open, I raised my peepers just in time to see her sashay in. That moll had gams that wouldn't quit. I slid my roscoe into the top drawer as I rose to greet her...

The patois of the hard-boiled detective story is a thing of beauty. Like the hep-cat's jive of the 30's and 40's, this colorful language tingles with excitement and danger. Gleaned from novels such as Raymond Chandler's The Big Sleep and Dashiell Hammett's The Maltese Falcon, these words slide over the tongue as smoothly as a shot of single-cask bourbon.

Other authors of note for this genre are Chester Himes, Robert B. Parker and Mickey Spillane. I strongly believe that the correct music can enhance the pleasure of reading. For this style, I recommend cool jazz: Lester Young - "The Complete Aladdin Recordings", Miles Davis - "The Birth of Cool", Stan Getz - "For Musicians Only".

"A good story cannot be devised; it has to be distilled." - Raymond Chandler