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Death Is A Lonely Business
''Death Is a Lonely Business'' is a mystery novel by American writer Ray Bradbury, published in 1985. The story, set in 1949, is about a series of murders that happen in Venice, California, then a declining seaside community in Los Angeles where Bradbury lived from 1942 to 1950. The main character and narrator (who never mentions his name) is a sensitive, modest writer, with a girlfriend studying in Mexico City. In the course of the story he meets Elmo Crumley, a detective who helps him solve the mystery behind all the semi-murders occurring among a series of eccentric characters in the forgotten town. The book evokes both the milieu and style of other mystery writers Raymond Chandler, Dashiell Hammett, James M. Cain, and Ross Macdonald, all of whom Bradbury names in the book's dedication, and James Crumley, after whom Bradbury named his detective. The main character is based on Bradbury himself from a period of his life just before his marriage and his success with '' The Martian ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ray Bradbury
Ray Douglas Bradbury (; August 22, 1920June 5, 2012) was an American author and screenwriter. One of the most celebrated 20th-century American writers, he worked in a variety of modes, including fantasy, science fiction, horror, mystery, and realistic fiction. Bradbury wrote many works and is widely known by the general public for his novel ''Fahrenheit 451'' (1953) and his short-story collections ''The Martian Chronicles'' (1950) and ''The Illustrated Man'' (1951). Most of his best known work is speculative fiction, but he also worked in other genres, such as the coming of age novel ''Dandelion Wine'' (1957) and the fictionalized memoir ''Green Shadows, White Whale'' (1992). He also wrote and consulted on screenplays and television scripts, including ''Moby Dick'' and ''It Came from Outer Space''. Many of his works were adapted into television and film productions as well as comic books. ''The New York Times'' called Bradbury "the writer most responsible for bringing modern ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Raymond Chandler
Raymond Thornton Chandler (July 23, 1888 – March 26, 1959) was an American-British novelist and screenwriter. In 1932, at the age of forty-four, Chandler became a detective fiction writer after losing his job as an oil company executive during the Great Depression. His first short story, " Blackmailers Don't Shoot", was published in 1933 in '' Black Mask,'' a popular pulp magazine. His first novel, ''The Big Sleep'', was published in 1939. In addition to his short stories, Chandler published seven novels during his lifetime (an eighth, in progress at the time of his death, was completed by Robert B. Parker). All but '' Playback'' have been made into motion pictures, some more than once. In the year before his death, he was elected president of the Mystery Writers of America. Chandler had an immense stylistic influence on American popular literature. He is a founder of the hardboiled school of detective fiction, along with Dashiell Hammett, James M. Cain and other ''Black Mask ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Venice, Los Angeles
Venice is a neighborhood of the city of Los Angeles within the Westside region of Los Angeles County, California. Venice was founded by Abbot Kinney in 1905 as a seaside resort town. It was an independent city until 1926, when it was annexed by Los Angeles. Venice is known for its canals, a beach, and Ocean Front Walk, a pedestrian promenade that features performers, fortune-tellers, and vendors. History 19th century In 1839, a region called La Ballona that included the southern parts of Venice, was granted by the Mexican government to Ygnacio and Augustin Machado and Felipe and Tomas Talamantes, giving them title to Rancho La Ballona. Later this became part of Port Ballona. Founding Venice, originally called "Venice of America", was founded by wealthy developer Abbot Kinney in 1905 as a beach resort town, west of Los Angeles. He and his partner Francis Ryan had bought of ocean-front property south of Santa Monica in 1891. They built a resort town on the north end of the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Fiction Set In 1949
Fiction is any creative work, chiefly any narrative work, portraying individuals, events, or places that are imaginary, or in ways that are imaginary. Fictional portrayals are thus inconsistent with history, fact, or plausibility. In a traditional narrow sense, "fiction" refers to written narratives in prose often referring specifically to novels, novellas, and short stories. More broadly, however, fiction encompasses imaginary narratives expressed in any medium, including not just writings but also live theatrical performances, films, television programs, radio dramas, comics, role-playing games, and video games. Definition Typically, the fictionality of a work is publicly marketed and so the audience expects the work to deviate in some ways from the real world rather than presenting, for instance, only factually accurate portrayals or characters who are actual people. Because fiction is generally understood to not fully adhere to the real world, the themes and context of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Novels By Ray Bradbury
A novel is a relatively long work of narrative fiction, typically written in prose and published as a book. The present English word for a long work of prose fiction derives from the for "new", "news", or "short story of something new", itself from the la, novella, a singular noun use of the neuter plural of ''novellus'', diminutive of ''novus'', meaning "new". Some novelists, including Nathaniel Hawthorne, Herman Melville, Ann Radcliffe, John Cowper Powys, preferred the term "romance" to describe their novels. According to Margaret Doody, the novel has "a continuous and comprehensive history of about two thousand years", with its origins in the Ancient Greek and Roman novel, in Chivalric romance, and in the tradition of the Italian renaissance novella.Margaret Anne Doody''The True Story of the Novel'' New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1996, rept. 1997, p. 1. Retrieved 25 April 2014. The ancient romance form was revived by Romanticism, especially the historica ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
American Mystery Novels
American(s) may refer to: * American, something of, from, or related to the United States of America, commonly known as the "United States" or "America" ** Americans, citizens and nationals of the United States of America ** American ancestry, people who self-identify their ancestry as "American" ** American English, the set of varieties of the English language native to the United States ** Native Americans in the United States, indigenous peoples of the United States * American, something of, from, or related to the Americas, also known as "America" ** Indigenous peoples of the Americas * American (word), for analysis and history of the meanings in various contexts Organizations * American Airlines, U.S.-based airline headquartered in Fort Worth, Texas * American Athletic Conference, an American college athletic conference * American Recordings (record label), a record label previously known as Def American * American University, in Washington, D.C. Sports teams Soccer * B ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
1985 American Novels
The year 1985 was designated as the International Youth Year by the United Nations. Events January * January 1 ** The Internet's Domain Name System is created. ** Greenland withdraws from the European Economic Community as a result of a new agreement on fishing rights. * January 7 – Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency launches ''Sakigake'', Japan's first interplanetary spacecraft and the first deep space probe to be launched by any country other than the United States or the Soviet Union. * January 15 – Tancredo Neves is elected president of Brazil by the Congress, ending the 21-year military rule. * January 20 – Ronald Reagan is privately sworn in for a second term as President of the United States. * January 27 – The Economic Cooperation Organization (ECO) is formed, in Tehran. * January 28 – The charity single record "We Are the World" is recorded by USA for Africa. February * February 4 – The border between Gibraltar and Spai ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Let's All Kill Constance
''Let's All Kill Constance'' is a mystery novel by American writer Ray Bradbury, published in 2002. Narrated by an unnamed Los Angeles writer and set in 1960, it chronicles an unexpected visit from aging Hollywood actress Constance Rattigan who gives him two death lists of once-famous people — with Constance's name on one of them, and the gradual unraveling of the mystery by the narrator with the help of private investigator Elmo Crumley. The narrator visits the listed people in order, all of whom die under mysterious circumstances shortly thereafter. Suspiciously, each of them claims to have met Constance, who always flees one step ahead of the narrator. Is Constance the true murderer, or is someone seeking to sever all ties to her associates before finally killing her? ''Let's All Kill Constance'' is a sequel to Bradbury's '' Death Is a Lonely Business'' (1985) and ''A Graveyard for Lunatics'' (1990). The novel references Ray Bradbury's better-known work, ''Fahrenheit 451 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Martian Chronicles
''The Martian Chronicles'' is a science fiction fix-up novel, published in 1950, by American writer Ray Bradbury that chronicles the exploration and settlement of Mars, the home of indigenous Martians, by Americans leaving a troubled Earth that is eventually devastated by nuclear war. Synopsis The book projects American society immediately after World War II into a technologically advanced future where the amplification of humanity's potentials to create and destroy have both miraculous and devastating consequences. Events in the chronicle include the apocalyptic destruction of both Martian and human civilizations, both instigated by humans, though there are no stories with settings at the catastrophes. The outcomes of many stories raise concerns about the values and direction of America of the time by addressing militarism, science, technology, and war time prosperity that could result in a global nuclear war (e.g., " There Will Come Soft Rains" and " The Million-Year Picnic" ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
James Crumley
James Arthur Crumley (October 12, 1939 – September 17, 2008)Local author James Crumley dies at 68 url=http://www.missoulian.com/articles/2008/09/18/news/local/news02.txt date=2008-09-17 accessdate=2008–09=18Fox, Margali''New York Times'' (September 19, 2008) was an American author. He was the author of violent hardboiled crime novels and several volumes of short stories and essays, as well as published and unpublished screenplays. He has been described as "one of modern crime writing's best practitioners", who was "a patron saint of the post-Vietnam private eye novel" and a cross between Raymond Chandler and Hunter S. Thompson. His book ''The Last Good Kiss'' has been described as "the most influential crime novel of the last 50 years." Crumley's first published novel, 1969's ''One to Count Cadence'', which was set in the Philippines and Vietnam, began as the thesis for his master's degree in creative writing from the Iowa Writers' Workshop in 1966. His novels ''The Last G ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Dedication
Dedication is the act of consecrating an altar, temple, church, or other sacred building. Feast of Dedication The Feast of Dedication, today Hanukkah, once also called "Feast of the Maccabees," is a Jewish festival observed for eight days from the 25th of Kislev (usually in December, but occasionally late November, due to the lunisolar calendar). It was instituted in the year 165 B.C. by Judas Maccabeus, his brothers, and the elders of the congregation of Israel in commemoration of the reconsecration of the Jewish Temple in Jerusalem, and especially of the altar of burnt offerings, after they had been desecrated during the persecution under Antiochus Epiphanes (168 BC). The significant happenings of the festival were the illumination of houses and synagogues, a custom probably taken over from the Feast of Tabernacles, and the recitation of . According to the Second Book of Chronicles, the dedication of Solomon's Temple took place in the week before the Feast of Tabernacles. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ross Macdonald
Ross Macdonald was the main pseudonym used by the American-Canadian writer of crime fiction Kenneth Millar (; December 13, 1915 – July 11, 1983). He is best known for his series of hardboiled novels set in Southern California and featuring private detective Lew Archer. Since the 1970s, Macdonald's works (particularly the Archer novels) have received attention in academic circles for their psychological depth, sense of place, use of language, sophisticated imagery and integration of philosophy into genre fiction. Brought up in the province of Ontario, Canada, Macdonald eventually settled in the state of California, where he died in 1983. Life Millar was born in Los Gatos, California, and raised in his Canadian parents' native Kitchener, Ontario. ''Millar'' was a Scots spelling of the surname Miller, and the author pronounced his name ''Miller'' rather than ''Millar''. When his father abandoned the family unexpectedly when Millar was four years old, he and his mother live ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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