A review by jbstaniforth
The Drowning Pool by Ross MacDonald

4.0

My favourite of MacDonald's Lew Archer novels so far. Exceedingly well written, especially for something that aspires to be pulp, it retreads hard boiled conventions with such a goose in its step that the whole thing seems somehow fresh. It has all the existential malaise and tortured plot twists of Chandler, but a surprising humanity as well-- something Chandler, though I loved him, often seemed sadly lacking.