Inherent Vice

Inherent Vice by Thomas Pynchon.

In late-1960s Los Angeles, private investigator Doc Sportello is drawn into a suspected kidnapping plot by an old girlfriend. Thomas Pynchon lets noir detection drift through a culture approaching the end of an era.

Read it for the instability of the clues, motives and explanations on offer. The novel asks how a detective can make sense of a world whose public story is changing around him.