Probably the book most people are familiar with due to the fantastic adaptation. But the book is better, unsurprisingly. Maybe I’ve acclimated to Ellroy’s style, but everything about this really clicked for me. It’s intricately plotted, the style really pops off the page, the way the department twists and typed a couple of the characters, and the way the tension from the last book bleeds into the edges, really making me wait for the shoe to drop. And when it does, boy does it drop.

Strangely, while this also meanders, everything feels more germane too, as the case is so centrally tied to the cops involved, it drives them in ways they aren’t even aware of—but the reader is. Again, Ellroy shows how disgusted he is with power and what it does to a person, and how that plus into how “justice” works in society. This time, the ramifications are like dominos that perfectly fall. There is always a an over annunciation of people having to violate their identities to function, feeding back into the cycle of boom-bust, again hit harder with Hush-Hush Magazine hitting the spectacle of death and debauchery.

The way The Big Nowhere, and to some extent, The Black Dahlia, roll into this is pretty fantastic. A few of the character arcs are pitch perfect, specifically Dudley. But there’s a weight from what came before landing squarely on the shoulders of the new folks too. I have a feeling reading it as one book in this bindup is really the way to go.