Macdonald's private eye, Lew Archer is as much of an institution as Perry Mason. Whereas Mason goes after the legal loophole, Archer generally comes up with the moral lacunae of humanity. A number of murders on in what starts as an investigation into a false identity on the golden fringe of the West Coast, Archer has uncovered a startling variety of cash induced corruption. It's a thinking man's murder mystery, and fast.