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  SNAPPY QUOTES FROM RAYMOND CHANDLER

"There was a desert wind blowing that night. It was one of those hot dry Santa Anas that come down through the mountain passes and curl your hair and make your nerves jump and your skin itch. On nights like that every booze party ends in a fight. Meek little wives feel the edge of the carving knife and study their husbands' necks. Anything can happen. You can even get a full glass of beer at a cocktail lounge." -- RED WIND

"What did it matter where you lay once you were dead?  In a dirty sump or in a marble tower on top of a high hill.  You were dead, you were sleeping the big sleep, you were not bothered by things like that.  Oil and water were the same as wind and air to you.  You just slept the big sleep, not caring about the nastiness of how you died or where you fell." -- THE BIG SLEEP

"She was a blonde. A blonde that could make a bishop kick a hole in a stained glass window." -- FAREWELL, MY LOVELY

"From thirty feet away she looked like a lot of class.  From ten feet away she looked like something made up to be seen from thirty feet away." -- THE HIGH WINDOW

"Even on Central Avenue, not the quietest dressed street in the world, he looked about as inconspicuous as a tarantula on a slice of angel food cake." -- FAREWELL, MY LOVELY

"She opened a mouth like a fire bucket and laughed.  That terminated my interest in her.  I couldn't hear the laugh but the hole in her face when she unzippered her teeth was all I needed." -- THE LONG GOODBYE

"The house itself was not so much. It was smaller than Buckingham Palace, rather gray for California, and probably had fewer windows than the Chrysler Building. I sneaked over to the side entrance and pressed a bell and somewhere a set of chimes made a deep mellow sound like church bells. A man in a striped vest and gilt buttons opened the door, bowed, took my hat and was through for the day." -- FAREWELL, MY LOVELY

"I walked back through the arch and started up the steps.  It was a nice walk if you liked grunting.  There were two hundred and eighty steps up to Cabrillo Street. They were drifted over with windblown sand and the handrail was as cold and wet as a toad's belly." -- FAREWELL, MY LOVELY