I’m no huge Grafton fan, though I like that her books are set in the Lew Archer cinematic universe. I find her early books too enamored of the PI tradition (and creaky PI witticisms); here she’s also indebted to Ross Macdonald’s themes, the interplay between respectable bourgeois families and institutions and those outside them. Gender roles here are interesting; the men don’t come off great, but there are few sympathetic women characters at all, most of whose bodies are described in harsh detail. A good book for a few days in the car, but not particularly memorable.