Ross Macdonald’s plots are just as intricate as Raymond Chandler’s, but somehow he manages to tie it all together with no loose ends. (Who did kill that chauffeur anyway?) The only way I can imagine Macdonald putting together his mysteries is by writing a straightforward novel without a detective, then putting all the events in the wrong order for his detective, ex-cop Lew Archer to discover one at a time. All the staples of the Lew Archer series are on display here, the post-war California setting, the miserable rich people, the people desperate for money, the psychological trauma underpinning it […]

I’ve apparently decided to read all of Ross Macdonald’s works this year (stay tuned) which means diving into his non-Archer novels. The Ferguson Affair hardly misses the pugnacious Lew Archer, with attorney Bill Gunnarson making for a suitable investigator. If Gunnarson seems to go an awfully long way for his client it’s an acceptable stretching of artistic license. Gunnarson is a private attorney asked to represent a young nurse caught trying to sell stolen jewelry. When he tries to verify her story about being given the ring by a charming suitor, Gunnarson finds himself caught up in a confusing kidnapping […]

In this intricately mapped detective novel, Macdonald’s ex-cop P.I. Lew Archer finds himself investigating three murders, committed at ten-year intervals and in multiple states. The interconnected nature of the killings and of the cast of characters speak to an expert at plotting out a story, while the nearly endless series of reversals and revelations speak to the imagination and wit of Macdonald, an author who deserves the same status as Dashiell Hammett and Raymond Chandler. Accosted right outside a courtroom where his testimony has just helped free an innocent woman, Lew Archer finds himself dragged into a runaway wife case which […]