The Zebra-Striped Hearse (Vintage Crime/Black Lizard)

I've liked everything I've read so far by MacDonald, and Zebra-Striped Hearse is no exception. What I found different is Archer's travels, be it Mexico, Nevada, and up and down California. In particular, his portrayal of an American colony in Mexico of drunks, artists, and others just hiding out, read true. Same with the surfer kids in their zebra striped hearse. It's the kind of writing that gives you a slice of what the early sixties was like, but in a way that doesn't sound dated, but accurate.
The novel as a whole is moody, its story a dark (and very sad)one of sexual depravity, psychological cruelty, a deliberate red herring or two, and of course, murder(s). To some extent I felt novel had too many characters, and it was hard to keep track of all the motivations, not to mention Archer's frenetic movements between Mexico, California, and Nevada. But with MacDonald you get a master of character creation who possesses excellent descriptive powers. He can create a memorable character, with a history in the space of a paragraph or two. He's amazing. And his scenes can very suggestive, very dark. In one, a little girl looking at a comic book suggests (possible) crimes of a much greater scale. But MacDonald doesn't dwell on it. He leaves you hanging, effectively haunting you for the rest of the book. You never know for sure, but it's that not knowing that shows MacDonald at his best. Within the scope of the novel, it's a small moment, but MacDonald cares about those small moments as he builds a whole.
If there is convolution in Zebra Striped Hearse, it's a small sin blown away by the fine descriptive powers of a master.

Ross MacDonald received the Mystery Writers of America Grand Master Award, and it's easy to see why. Though this novel is over thirty years old, it is a meticulous, finely written, moody, introspective novel which can be read and enjoyed today easily. It is hardly dated at all, with the exception of some minor details.
Full of interesting complex characters, this book is full of the stuff which excellent detective novels are made of: good, evil, and motives galore.
As with MacDonald's books, it is complicated and moves to and fro to a degree that careful reading is necessary, but definately well worth it. While you're reading, the pace increases, the tension rises, the scenes are wonderfully interesting and the characters are delightfully real. The clues are precisely set out and carefully explained as the novel progresses. An excellent read for detective novel fans!

Ross McDonald, the pen name of Kenneth Millar, is a fantastic detective novel writer. His protagonist, Lew Archer, is the classic private investigator based near Hollywood. His beat is California and his novels are based in the late 40's thru the 50's and into the early '60's. I decided to start with his first Archer novel and read the series in the sequence of publication. McDonaldd develops great mysteries with highly fleshed out characters. I've just finished the Zebra Stripped Hearse and am, as I've been doing, side-tracking to another author and genre between the Archer novels. Great fun!

Mr MacDonald writes hard boiled P.I. stories from the late 40's to 50's. His main character is more deeply emotional and reflective than Chandler and Hammett's are. The way he writes, you can easily imagine the scenes he describes. I would recommend any of his works.

"The Zebra-Striped Hearse" initially published in 1962, is the author's tenth book, one in a series of Lew Archer mysteries, described by The New York Times as "the finest series of detective novels ever written by an American." One of the California-set Archer series, "The Drowning Pool," was made into a movie starring Paul Newman as the Archer character, renamed Harper for the film. The American author of the series was Ross Macdonald, Californian, who wrote in the great hard-boiled tradition of Los Angeles noir, following on the heels of Dashiell Hammett and Raymond Chandler. (In fact, at one point in this book, we appear to have a dead lady in a lake, which would have to be considered a nod to Chandler's "The Lady in the Lake.") Unfortunately, there will be no more entries in the Lew Archer series: Macdonald passed from the scene years ago, if memory serves, suffering from disabling Alzheimer's disease that prevented him from writing while he still lived.

"The Hearse" opens with what appears to be a variant on the Cinderella story: rich American princess wants to marry, stepmother stands in the way. Although we quickly learn the union is more harshly opposed by the girl's father, the moneyed king. And the would-be prince is a bounder, handsome man with artistic pretensions, shady past, too many women in his life. Then, as this is a mystery, the bodies start showing up, though later rather than sooner, as some of us prefer. But it's a tight, reasonably complex, absorbing story, well-told. The opening even foreshadows the ending, as was always the rule: Macdonald was an able writer. However, in coming back to reread this book after many years, the most striking thing about it was its close adherence to what I always considered this author's formula: all the bad things happening in the open here and now grow out of bad things done secretly years ago.

Macdonald was also an excellent descriptive writer and he's left us an indelible picture of the Los Angeles of his time. Adults drink and smoke heavily-- the author describes smoke-filled rooms such as would never be tolerated in the LA of today. Beach bums have to watch their pennies. The city's smog is battened down upon it by clouds, as if they were "the lid of a pressure cooker," an item most readers today will not know. Orange County, today a series of famously wealthy television-worthy suburbs, was then a rural place where they grew oranges: Macdonald calls it Citrus County. He describes the now world-renowned home of the movie-making elite, and other elites, Malibu, as a "straggling beach town," and mentions the "shabby fringes" of Pacific Palisades, a location where you'd be hard put to find anything shabby today. In sum, it seems that, whether he aimed to or not, Macdonald also produced an abiding picture of his home town over the years.

Ross Macdonald was in top form when he wrote The Zebra-Striped Hearse. I found this engaging Lew Archer mystery to be an incredibly compelling page turner of a novel.

The narrative begins with ace PI Lew Archer being hired by Mark Blackwell, a wealthy, puritanical, ex-army colonel. Blackwell's daughter Harriet has taken up with a penniless artist named Burke Damis. And quite naturally, Dad does not approve. So he hires Archer to look into Damis' background.

Archer's subsequent investigation takes him to a number of different locales in California, Nevada and Mexico and proves to be quite fruitful. He learns a number of disturbing things about Mr. Damis, including the fact that Damis is not his real name.

But that's only the beginning. Archer and the reader eventually learn that nothing is at it appears. As the suspenseful plot unfolds, a hidden web of intrigue, deception and family dysfunction is skillfully unmasked. And ultimately, the multifaceted plot all comes together at the stunningly effective conclusion.

The Zebra-Striped Hearse is a prime example of Ross Macdonald at his very best. An enthusiastic 5 stars.

All of the Lew Archer mysteries by Ross Macdonald are very good, and all but two or three are excellent. This one is in the top three of four, which means it is one of the best mystery novels ever written, and beyond that, it is an excellent novel, period.

It is the tenth of eighteen, from 1962.

MacDonald started out imitating Raymond Chandler, and he was quite good at that. But as the years passed, the most overtly film-noir and hard-boiled aspects faded, as did the violence (though there was never very much of that by modern standards). Through his very strong middle period he combined elements of the hard-boiled with sharp clever writing and a wonderful ability to perceive and reveal people. Here, in this book, we have one of his strongest and most successful books.

It is very complex, and the reader would be rewarded by keeping a note pad and jotting down the first time and place a character is mentioned, and other key points. I’ve added a list below. But beyond the mystery story aspects, no other mystery novelist that I am aware of has so many clever descriptions, insightful observations, compelling similes, and such deep observations on the human condition. He is simply the best writer of all mystery writers.

Like most of the Lew Archer novels, the young people of today are haunted by the actions of their elders. That is not emphasized quite so much in this one as others. Recurring theme: art and artists.

It’s a great loss to the world that MacDonald developed Alzheimer’s at a rather young age. I would love to read a nineteenth Lew Archer novel.

The story begins, like many in the Lew Archer canon, with trouble in a wealthy family. Ex-colonel Mark Blackwell, a strait-laced army man, comes to Archer’s office to say that his only child, 24 year old Harriet, is about to run off with a penniless nobody who calls himself an artist, named Burke Damis. Blackwell is furious that Harriet would defy him and “ruin her life” in that way. He think Damis knows that when she turns 25, Harriet will inherit a lot of money. Isobel Blackwell, his second wife of a year or so, is more sympathetic to Harriet.

Archer takes a disliking to Mark Blackwell but agrees to investigate Damis to discover his background. Thanks to Harriet, Damis has been living in the Blackwell beach house at Malibu where he can paint. Archer finds him there and stakes out the house, sipping coffee at a small diner overlooking it. A group of teenage surfers driving a zebra-striped hearse come in.

When Damis and Harriet drive off, Archer follows them to Blackwell’s mansion in exclusive Bel Air, where an ugly confrontation occurs. Harriet and Damis drive off. Blackwell wants Archer to track them down. He begins by returning to the beach house. A thorough search turns up one odd item: an airline ticket stub from Guadalajara Mexico to LA in the name of Quincy Ralph Simpson. It is now dark and Archer notices the same group of teenagers he saw before now camped on the beach below the house. One of the girls is wearing a dirty but good quality Harris Tweed overcoat.

Archer flies to Mexico where coincidentally(?) Blackwell’s first wife has been living in Ajijic (a real place) for ten years with her second husband, a retired dentist named Keith Hatchen. As Archer follows the trail in Ajijic we meet a wonderful collection of colorful, well delineated characters. This is perhaps the best part of the book. It turns out that Damis and Harriet met there about a month earlier.

I won’t attempt to summarize the plot much more, except to say that it is wonderfully complex but not bewilderingly so. Archer discovers that “Burke Damis” is an alias; his real name is Bruce Campion, and he was suspected of murdering his wife Dolly about six months earlier in San Mateo County, which is just south of San Francisco. A few months before that Dolly and Quincy Ralph Simpson both worked near Lake Tahoe where, surprise, surprise, Blackwell has another vacation home. Dolly grew up in the little town of Citrus Junction (fictional), which is apparently in the orange belt about fifty miles east of LA.

So we have a hexagon of key locations: Malibu, LA, Ajijic, Citrus Junction, Tahoe, and San Mateo County.

The characters:

Mark Blackwell, ex army Colonel, the ramrod type.
Isobel Blackwell, his second wife, married a year or so.
Harriet, daughter of Mark Blackwell and his first wife, Pauline.

Some teenage surfers at Malibu who drive an old hearse they painted with zebra stripes, and sometimes pick up interesting things in the surf.

Pauline (Blackwell) Hatchen, mother of Harriet, ex-wife of Mark.
Keith Hatchen, retired dentist.

Burke Damis. Rumor in Ajijic is that he murdered his wife Dolly.
Q. R. Simpson Quincy Ralph. Just an alias of Damis? No; in fact he was murdered not long before.
Vicky, wife of Q. R. Simpson.

Chauncey Reynolds, owner of a bar in Ajijic.
Claude Stacy, manager of a posada.
Helen Wilkinson, aging ex-actress, retired to Ajijic.
Bill Wilkinson, husband of Helen.
Anne Castle, artist and weaver, owns a craft store in Ajijic. serviceable.

Bruce Campion, aspiring artist.
Dolly Stone Campion.

Hank Sholto, Lake Tahoe, Nevada side; looks after houses.
Fawn King, friend of QRS in Tahoe.

Edmund B. Damis, art professor at Berkeley.
Evelyn Jurgenson, sister of Bruce Campion.

Mr. and Mrs. Stone, Dolly’s parents, live in Citrus Junction.
Mr. and Mrs. Jaimet, former owners of the house across the street from the Stone’s. Mr. Jaimet, deceased, was a respected high school principal. Mrs. Jaimet, well, I’ll say no more about her.

Several sheriffs and policemen.

This is a superb story, superbly written as only Ross MacDonald could. It doesn't get any better than this folks.

Examples of what I call good writing:

She jumped as though lightning had struck her, not for the first time.

I bumped my head on a low hanging fruit which was probably a mango. Above the trees the stars hung in the freshly cleared sky like clusters of some smaller, brighter fruit too high to reach.

The sky had cleared, and a few sunbathers were lying around in the sand like bodies after a catastrophe. Beyond the surf line six surfers waited in prayerful attitudes on their boards.

Everyone seems to agree that Ross MacDonald ranks right up there with Dashiell Hammett and Raymond Chandler as one of the greatest detective mystery writers of all time. The Zebra-Striped Hearse is yet another example that proves this is true. Ross MacDonald at his usual excellence.

When I first started that book, I was glad to be able to read another Marlowe story even though I had read them all before. It was Chandler without its cold humour. But after some pages I realized it was a true original novel and not only a copy of the master. I eventually enjoyed it, with its own style. The scenario is good, the character is interesting etc. I would recommend it to anybody that would like to read classical black novels.

A slightly more modern Lew Archer novel. Does not disappoint fans looking for action, dark descriptions of characters and mood. Again, the past is not dead and has severe consequences in the present.