Ross MacDonald

Ross MacDonald is the pseudonym used by Kenneth Millar. He was born in California, raised and educated in Canada and Europe. He served in the U.S. Naval Reserve and traveled widely. He was married to mystery writer Margaret Millar and lived in Santa Barbara, California, the setting for most of his Lew Archer novels. He died there in 1983.
MacDonald wrote over twenty Lew Archer novels and many more short stories. Archer first appeared in 1949 in The Moving Target. It was made into a movie, renamed Harper, starring Paul Newman. Newman and his actress wife Joanne Woodard earned accolades for the movie version of The Drowning Pool. Blue City and Criminal Behavior were also made into successful movies. Brian Keith starred in the Lew Archer TV show in 1975. Archer, more hard-boiled in the earlier novels, specializes in cases involving family murders among the better classes of Santa Barbara. He must learn Why the crimes have been committed in order to find the guilty person. The Lew Archer books can be said to be "Why Dunnits".
MacDonald was given the Gold Dagger Award for The Far Side of the Dollar and awarded the Grand Master Award for Lifetime Achievement from the Mystery Writers of America.

Books:

Archer at Large	Archer in Hollywood	Archer in Jeopardy
Black Money	Blue City	Find a Victim
Meet Me at the Morgue	Sleeping Beauty	The Barbarous Coast
The Blue Hammer	The Chill	The Dark Tunnel
The Doomsters	The Drowning Pool	The Far Side of the Dollar
The Ferguson Affair	The Galton Case	The Goodbye Look
The Instant Enemy	The Ivory Grin	The Moving Target
The Three Roads	The Underground Man	The Way Some People Die
The Wycherly Woman	The Zebra-Striped Hearse	Trouble Follows Me

Characters:

Brian Keith	Harper	Joanne Woodard
Lew Archer	Paul Newman

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