A review by kmecholsky
The Drowning Pool by Ross MacDonald

4.0

If, like me, you had hardly given mystery a second glance while you were forming your literary taste, you should read this book (or any of MacDonald's Lew Archer novels - this is actually the second). There are so many incredible books out there to be digested, I didn't feel I had the time or mental space to waste on detective fiction. But if you know me, you'll know I've changed my tune in recent years. And if you want to change your tune, too, you could do a lot worse than start with Ross MacDonald. He's the most literary of all crime writers I've read. Raymond Chandler did a great job of elevating the P.I. to errant-knight status, but Ross MacDonald's novels play out in a much more subtle way. The stories themselves extend outward thematically, touching upon a wide array of life. Archer's a much more human detective figure than Hammett's Continental Op and Spade (though Hammett's creations are frightening and in need of more attention) or Chandler's Marlowe (though he's impressively heroic). You're never really sure how much Archer knows, how much he feels. You're not sure he's sure.

A good way to get an understanding of MacDonald's (and Archer's) approach to mystery is to listen to Archer himself in the novel (I'm paraphrasing): "I'm interested in the truth. Not big truth, whatever that is. But little truths. Who, what, where, when, why." Archer's the first postmodern detective. And for all of the problems with Harper (based on the first Archer novel, The Moving Target) as an adaptation, its ending (though different from the novel), succinctly embodies how MacDonald helped change the genre. But you'll have to see it to know what I'm talking about.