NEW YORK (AP) - Philip Marlowe will soon be back on the case.
The sleuth of such classic Raymond Chandler novels as "The Big Sleep" and "The Long Goodbye" will return in a new novel by John Banville.
Henry Holt and Co. announced Tuesday that the book, currently untitled, is scheduled for next year. It has been authorized by the estate of Chandler, who died in 1959, and will be set in Marlowe's fictional Bay City.
The 66-year-old Banville is an Irish author and Man Booker Prize winner. He will write under the pen name Benjamin Black, which he has used for previous crime novels. His current Benjamin Black novel, "Vengeance," came out Tuesday.
Other writers who have featured Marlowe include Robert B. Parker, Sara Peretsky and Max Allan Collins.