Caught up in a romance with an amoral woman and his benevolent efforts to help a severely dysfunctional family, Lew Archer barely has time to stop a brutal murderer from killing again. Reprint. NYT.
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
The Drowning Pool
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Most writers who work in a specific genre such as science fiction or detective stories write with a comfortable narrowness, their ambitions constricted by well-worn conventions; a rare few attain something much deeper, as the scope of their explorations and the originality of their prose operate in a kind of tension with the genre's confines. Ross Macdonald is one such writer. In a series of 25 novels written between 1944 and 1976, all but five featuring Lew Archer as protagonist, Macdonald picked up the baton dropped by Raymond Chandler and Dashiell Hammett and took the genre to new heights.
The Drowning Pool, first published in 1950, is the second Lew Archer novel. It opens in classic hard-boiled fashion, with a well-dressed woman hesitantly engaging Archer's services at his L.A. office. Soon he's digging up secrets in her oil-rich hometown, and the themes that preoccupied Macdonald throughout his career begin to emerge: tormented families, buried secrets that fester through multiple generations, environmental destruction, concealed paternity, and the brutal contrast between rich and poor. Macdonald's later novels--including The Galton Case (1959), The Chill (1964), and The Underground Man (1971)--showed increased maturity and a tone less tied to tradition, but The Drowning Pool returns to the virtues that are the hallmarks of Mcdonald's work: complex and compelling plotting, psychological depth, just enough mayhem, and highly economical prose that routinely rises to something near poetry. --This text refers to the Paperback edition.
From Library Journal
Published in 1965, 1963, and 1950, respectively, this trio feature Macdonald's hard-boiled private detective Lew Archer. The plots involve murder, deceit, blackmail, sex, and all those other goodies that make for great crime stories.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Paperback edition.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Paperback edition.
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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
A Ross MacDonald is like an extremely well crafted 1950's black & white noir movie. Nothing comes through in it's true color, everything is projected in shades of gray, the action is stately yet never drags, and the characters are all vaguely threatening.
All of MacDonald's novels exhibit certain basic themes--tormented families, buried secrets that fester through multiple generations, environmental destruction, and the brutal contrast between rich and poor. The key to MacDonald's long running success was Archers realism and authenticity, MacDonald's ability to craft complex yet understandable stories, his mastery of language, and his ability to generate a specific atmosphere of threatening suspense on a consistent basis.
All of the above referenced themes are present in The Drowning Pool, which I think is MacDonald's best novel, though The Underground Man is right up there as well.
MacDonald's novels aren't just mind candy-reading him is a literary experience. I believe that is why he was successful in a sort of restrained way. Escapists will not get into these books-they are too cerebral. If you want to your books affect you, MacDonald and Archer are your kind of guy's.
Format:Paperback
I'm not a big fan of detective series because they tend to become robotic in plot and characterization, but the Ross MacDonald/Lew Archer series is an exception. Crisp language, tight plots, and geat dialog make for a gripping story.
A sad sidenote. Don't rent/watch the insipid Paul Newman/Joanne Woodward movie 'loosely' based on the book. Instead of LA they set it in New Orleans and they basically rearranged all the characters into pale versions of their literary counterparts. Just thought I'd let you know.
Format:Paperback
Ross Macdonald describes America the way it really is, mindblowing, desperate, full of paranoia!! His descriptions of faded starlets and worn-out harlots wandering around Hollywood, talking tough and acting mean, he describes the slums, the shady characters out to make a buck, the cops with trigger fingers and intolerant faces, it is all there. I have reccomended his books to friends in Europe, they don't seem to see it the same way I do. I bet it's still a damn good read for most people.
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Most recent customer reviews
5.0 out of 5 stars
Dashiell's Hammett's heir goes him one better
Ross MacDonald is usually compared to Dashiell Hammett and Raymond Chandler. However Lew Archer is never hard-bitten (despite hard-bitten experience) as Hammett and Chandler's... Read more
Published on Jun 20 2000 by Unique ViewPoint
5.0 out of 5 stars
thorougly excellent
MacDonald was not only the heir to craftwork of Hammett and Chandler, he may well have brought this particular strain of crime fiction to its pinacle. Read more
Published on Mar 17 2000 by lucas cragg
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