Fake Book Review: The Long Embrace By Judith Freeman

If Harold Bloom is right and Shakespeare invented the human personality, then you can make a solid argument from inference that Raymond Chandler invented Los Angeles.  He took the proverbial "[x amount] of suburbs in search of a city" and imbued them with a dark, highly original cohesion.

Chandler, no doubt, is having a good laugh at the paragraph above -- probably over afternoon highballs at that great gin joint in the sky. 

He was a wretched alcoholic, Chandler, who produced his best work over the 10-year period when he swore off the sauce and labored over creating his style.  Then, Hollywood came calling.  Things went downhill from there.  Big surprise. 

Freeman tells a great biographical story about Chandler, and she manages to illuminate some interesting corners of L.A.'s past and present while she's at it. 

She comes at Chandler's life by way of two defining themes:

• Chandler had a 37 year marriage to a woman 18 years his senior. 
• Chandler lived in something like 50 apartments and houses during his life in Southern California.

Much of The Long Embrace's narrative involves Freeman tracking Chandler and his wife as they move from downtown, to the Westside, back eastward, out to the desert, down to La Jolla, back near downtown, etc, etc...  It was a great way for a writer to get know his material, and it's a great way for a reader to get to know the city.