'An acknowledged literary landmark' Robert Graves Dashiell Hammett is the true i
nventor of modern detective fiction and the creator of the private eye, the isol
ated hero in a world where treachery is the norm. The Continental Op was his gre
at first contribution to the genre and these seven stories, which first appeared
in the magazine Black Mask, are the best examples of Hammett's early writing, i
n which his formidable literary and moral imagination is already operating at fu
ll strength. The Continental Op is the dispassionate fat man working for the Con
tinental Detective Agency, modelled on the Pinkerton Agency, whose only interest
is in doing his job in a world of violence, passion, desperate action and great
excitement.
