Ellroy's book is a fictionalised account of the murder of good-time girl Elizabeth Short in Los Angeles in 1947. The recent film is based on this book, rather than actual events.

Ellroy tells the story from the perspective of two officers assigned to investigate the murder of the Black Dahlia. Bucky and Lee are sparring partners in the boxing ring, LAPD officers, and obsessive characters when it comes to women. They both love Kay, a woman rescued by Lee from the clutches of a gangster some years before, and they both become obsessed with finding the Dahlia's killer, to the point where it threatens to ruin both of their careers and lives.

I've never read any of Ellroy's other work before, and it took me a while to stop hearing a noirish Sam Spade narrator in my head as I was reading. Ellroy's writing evokes the period well, and the book is most effective as a crime thriller. When the denouement comes though, I had guessed it several pages before, and the neat ending is a bit disappointing when you know that Beth Short's real killer has never been identified.