Match Book
The Drowning Pool
Ross Macdonald
1950 · Mystery
How it reads
The Drowning Pool is mystery (hardboiled detective mystery, specifically), and its dominant mood is dark. It goes to difficult places and doesn't look away. The pace is moderate — neither a page-turner nor a slow burn — so it holds up whether you read it in long sittings or short ones.
It's set in a big city setting, in the recent past, told in the third person, staying close to one character. Its central concerns are justice, class and society and secrets. In weight it's heavy and literary — denser, more serious, and more demanding of you.
It opens a series. The ending is bittersweet: it resolves, but at a price. It's a short book. It's well known, the kind of book most keen readers have heard of.
Pick it up if…
- you're in the mood for something dark
- you want something to chew on
- you're drawn to stories about justice
Maybe not if…
- you need something cosy, heartwarming or funny
All 15 dimensions
- Genre
- mystery
- Author gender
- male
- Author experience
- prolific veteran
- Setting: place
- big city
- Setting: time
- recent past
- Mood / feeling
- dark
- Pace
- moderate
- Tone / weight
- heavy and literary
- Length
- short
- Narrative style
- third person, one viewpoint
- Publication era
- classic
- Popularity
- well known
- Series vs standalone
- first in a series
- Themes
- justice, class and society, secrets
- Ending style
- bittersweet
What these mean: the 15 dimensions of a book.
Books with a similar reading
The closest books in Match Book's catalogue across the same dimensions, and what they share.
We Are All the Same in the DarkJulia HeaberlinShares: mystery, dark mood, heavy and literary tone, moderate pace- Long Bright RiverLiz MooreShares: mystery, dark mood, heavy and literary tone, moderate pace
The PaperboyPete DexterShares: mystery, dark mood, heavy and literary tone, moderate pace
The Sign of FourArthur Conan DoyleShares: mystery, dark mood, moderate pace, set in big city- ConfessionsKanae MinatoShares: mystery, dark mood, heavy and literary tone, set in big city
The Glass KeyDashiell HammettShares: mystery, dark mood, bittersweet ending, set in big city
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