a complex universe, dark but captivating

I think that we should not only read this book as a simple thriller but as a novel which would have slipped a detective story that spans several years. The atmosphere of the 40s in the US is actually paplpable throughout the novel.

Despite some rather long passages, the story is interesting showing us characters with contradictory characters nor white nor black, never perfect, particularly within the police, making it the complexity of history.

The end of the book is well in suspense until the end.

What I have had a little more difficulty understanding is the morbid fascination of the young woman murdered on the policeman when he has not known ...

But it includes a lot of things by reading the biography of James Ellroy, including his own obsession for the murder of his mother who profondemment marked the course of his life and therefore his writing.