Noir Like Me

We can’t all be Raymond Chandler, but you wouldn’t know it from the book blurbs. Crime fiction has been lousy with “Chandler heirs” ever since Chandler--himself dubbed the successor to Dashiell Hammett--turned cynical-yet-romantic L.A. private eye Philip Marlowe loose in hardboiled classics such as “The Lady in the Lake” and “The Big Sleep.” Take Kem Nunn, whose latest surf-noir opera, “Tijuana Straits,” wears this jacket blurb from the Washington Post: “Kem Nunn is the most accomplished practitioner of California noir writing today, the principal heir to the tradition of Raymond Chandler and Nathanael West.” He isn’t the only one. Below, a body count.

Chandler spawn: Michael Connelly

Marlowe-esque gumshoe: Los Angeles police detective Harry Bosch.

Hard-boiled moments: “The Concrete Blonde,” “The Black Echo,” “City of Bones.”

Anointed by: Hackwriters.com (“Connelly is the true heir of the hard-boiled tradition perfected by Raymond Chandler’s ‘Philip Marlowe’ novels.”)

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Chandler spawn: John Shannon

Marlowe stand-in: Aerospace worker-turned-investigator Jack Liffey.

Hard-boiled moments: “The Concrete River,” “Terminal Island.”

Anointed by: Blurbs fellow “heir” Michael Connelly: “Tough and engaging. ‘The Concrete River’ is my kind of L.A. novel--hard as nails with a soft spot in the middle. Philip Marlowe would have been proud of his contemporary heir.”

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Chandler spawn: Dennis Lehane

Marlowe stand-in: Boston private eyes Patrick Kenzie and Angela Gennaro.

Hard-boiled moments: “Darkness, Take My Hand,” “Prayers for Rain.”

Anointed by: Publishers Weekly (“The hippest heir of Hammett and Chandler.”)

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Chandler spawn: Elmore Leonard

Marlowe stand-in: Different from book to book.

Hard-boiled moments: “Mr. Paradise,” “Out of Sight,” “Tishomingo Blues.”

Anointed by: Philadelphia Inquirer (“Leonard is a consummate stylist, a deserving heir to the mantle of Dashiell Hammett and Raymond Chandler.”)

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Chandler spawn: Robert B. Parker

Marlowe stand-in: Boston private eye Spenser.

Hard-boiled moments: “Bad Business,” “Back Story.”

Anointed by: David Geherin, author of “Sons of Sam Spade” (1980): “The legitimate heir to the Hammett-Chandler-Macdonald tradition.”

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Chandler spawn: Robert Ferrigno

Marlowe stand-in: Different from book to book.

Hard-boiled moments: “The Wake-Up,”

“The Horse Latitudes.”

Anointed by: Entertainment Weekly (“Every few years another writer is described as the next Raymond Chandler, but Robert Ferrigno

may be the real thing”); Los Angeles Times

Book Review (“Like other inheritors of the Hammett-Chandler-Ross Macdonald private-eye tradition, Ferrigno balances the tough doings with a strong sense of moral outrage and compassion.”)

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Chandler spawn: James Ellroy

Marlowe stand-in: Different from book to book.

Hard-boiled moments: “L.A. Confidential,” “White Jazz.”

Anointed by: Bookseller powells.com (“James Ellroy is the heir apparent to Raymond Chandler. His dark, convoluted, steroid-infused crime novels have made him the reigning king of L.A. Noir.”)

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Chandler spawn: James Crumley

Marlowe stand-in: Montana private eye C.W. Sughrue.

Hard-boiled moments: “The Last Good Kiss,” “The Wrong Case.”

Anointed by: Himself (“I always introduce my work by explaining that I am a bastard child of Raymond Chandler.”)