The most important character in the novels of Ross Macdonald is Lew Archer. Archer, a modern private investigator, is only loosely patterned after such influential predecessors as Hammett's Sam Spade or Chandler's Philip Marlowe. Directly working against the tradition created by Mickey Spillane's Mike Hammer, Lew Archer is more of an acute observer and less of a participant in the Macdonald novels.

Archer is not the central character who makes things work out; rather, he is the author's narrative persona, the one who filters the story to the reader. As a result, Macdonald's books, while containing an action plot, are not of the slam-bang style, like a Mike Hammer story. The novels are more reflective, geared for social observation rather than pure action.

Within the fictional world Archer probes and questions, laying open the stories of the various other characters in the novel. His job, as with all...