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Portrait image of Raymond Chandler Photo: Bettmann via Getty Images (1954)

Sample of authors

Chandler, Raymond

American detective writer, born in Chicago. He spent his early childhood in Wyoming and Nebraska. His parents divorced when he was six years old, and in 1897 he moved with his mother to England, where he become a British citizen in 1907. Chandler received a classical education at Dulwich College in London in 1900-05. In 1905-07, he studied in both France and Germany and next worked as a reporter...

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Literary figures

Emily Pollifax

Gender: Female

Elderly American widow, 60+, bored with tea parties and charity work, who applies for a job as a ‘secret agent’ with the CIA. She is allowed to try and manages it so well that she gets a permanent job and becomes the main character in a suite of novels by Dorothy Gilman. Mrs Emily Pollifax is quick-witted, articulate and has a brown belt in karate. She eventually marries the patient Cyrus Reed.

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