Perfidia by James Ellroy

James Ellroy’s Perfidia is quite an undertaking, not only for the reader, but also for its shear scope of Los Angeles history. The first of a new quartet of novels that spans the war years of 1941 to 1946 in America leading up to the events in the original L.A. Quartet that consists of TheBlack Dahlia, The Big Nowhere, L.A. Confidential, and White Jazz. The novel also connects with Ellroy’s most recent work, dubbed the Underworld USA Trilogy, consisting of American Tabloid, Blood’s A Rover, and The Cold Six Thousand. Overall his cannon of work unveils a fictitious, dark and hidden history of the Los Angeles police force that works its way into the FBI and finally into the political landscape of the 1960’s and early 70’s.

Admittedly, I was intimidated by tackling such an expansive book coupled with the fact that it’s been many years since I’ve read the original quartet. However, my fears quickly vaporized once I remembered that I was in the hands of a master crime writer. Personally, I think Ellroy is a true successor to Hammett and Chandler in the ways that the authors re-create the hard-boiled criminal underworld with acute vernacular and criminal intent. What is interesting about Ellroy’s style is that it is not merely an imitation of Hammett or Chandler’s work, but an entirely new beast of hard-boiled tough-guy detectives that surpasses Spade, Marlowe, or even the entire Continental Op. This is the next wave of crime writing and it’s exciting because Ellroy is still alive and kicking.

The inciting incident and backdrop of the novel is an investigation into a Japanese family’s ritualistic suicide called seppuku; however, homicide is quickly determined after the investigation reveals key elements that don’t fit in with the ritual. More importantly, this family’s slaying happens on the eve of Pearl Harbor’s bombing which causes resentment, violence, and riots in Los Angeles against Asian minorities. Sadly, the Los Angeles population has trouble distinguishing between the Chinese and Japanese races. Also, in question is whether the murdered family had prior knowledge of Pearl Harbor’s attack due to the presumed suicide note found at the scene of the crime.

Soon after the attack, the L.A.P.D begins to round up questionable Japanese residents into holding cells and work farms. A subplot emerges about farmlands bought for commercial development, but until the war is over, the land becomes Japanese prison camps for monetary gain. A surge of patriotism causes both civilians and the police force to enlist into the armed forces. This action causes a hardship for the Police Department losing many of their best men and potential cadets to the war.

Employed by the L.A.P.D. is police chemist Hideo Ashida, the Department’s sole Japanese employee. Frustrated by being the only Asian minority on the force and hampered by his closet homosexuality, Ashida works hard to keep his position on the force and preventing his family’s detainment in a war camp. Ashida’s commanding officers, Sergeant Dudley Smith and Captain William Parker (Whiskey Bill), quickly recognize his resourcefulness and begin to use him to promote each of their own questionable agendas.

Dudley Smith is both brilliant and sinister. Capable of seducing his prey into unsuspected collaboration and astonishing acts of violence while at the same time manipulating multiple police investigations to his advantage. His acts are incorrigible and, at times, highly intelligent, but motivated by the need for solutions, regardless if they are the correct ones. Before New Year’s Eve, City Hall demands a resolution that the family’s murderer be Japanese, perpetuating a Japanese on Japanese crime that justifies the acts against L.A.’s Japanese population. Therefore, Dudley works to find a Japanese killer. Dudley’s web of deceit is so intricate that the character creates a coded chart in his office so that he can keep track of all his deeds. Meanwhile, Dudley tries to maintain an affair with the one and only Bette Davis.

On the other hand, Whiskey Bill Parker thrives on political career moves that edge him towards the Police Chief’s desk. His hard drinking and public spousal abuse blemish his reputation. Parker entraps a young woman named Kay Lake whose estranged marriage to the department’s Lee Blanchard connects her back with suspected criminal activities within the police force. Her previous testimony has kept Lee Blanchard out of trouble. She and Hideo Ashida also share a mutual affection for a recent police enrollee Bucky Bleichert. Kay willingly partakes in the adventure of a lifetime to oust and infiltrate social-lite communist Claire De Haven’s camp. De Haven, aka The Red Queen and her party are in the process of publishing anti-propaganda tracts against the Los Angeles police department exposing the brutality against the Japanese minorities. Eventually, Parker’s motivation for ousting De Haven becomes confused with his obsession for Kay. Likewise, Dudley’s obsession for Bette Davis causes catastrophic events too.

As different sides of the same coin, Dudley and Parker’s characters clash and complement each other nicely. Similarly, both Kay Lake and Hideo Ashida are pawns in a deadly game where no one is innocent of anything. Every character has something concealed. To whom to swear their allegiance is constantly blurred and continuously shifty. Eventually, every character questions how their role will play out in the bigger picture, which is precisely the point Ellroy makes with Perfidia: don’t sweat the small stuff because in the end it does not matter. When the murder mystery becomes unveiled, the dark manipulations of all the characters and the police force, paired with the declaration of war, manage to place the actual truth on hold. The murderer remains protected by the course of history. To the Mayor’s office and the higher echelons in the department, the true guilty party does not matter as long as the right person burns for the job. History will move on regardless of the outcome. Orchestration of events can happen anyway that you want them to. Which is exactly what Ellroy has done inside his Los Angeles universe mixing true historical characters and events with fictional ones; concocting resolutions that suggest the truths about the Los Angeles police world.

Ellroy’s universe works beautifully. The power of this novel rests in Ellroy’s ability to write economically and efficiently. I don’t want to fool anyone by my meager attempt at summarizing the plot; every cog in this wheel seems meticulously greased. Elloy’s work deserves, or rather demands, consumption.