Clandestine (1982)

Blurb

Clandestine is an 1982 crime novel by American author James Ellroy. Set in the 1950s, the protagonist is an ambitious LA Cop, Fred Underhill. Ellroy dedicated Clandestine, "to Penny Nagler".
Officer Freddy Underhill is a young cop on the rise working out of the LAPD's Wilshire station in 1951. He covers the beat with his partner Herbert Lawton "Wacky" Walker, a World War II veteran with a Medal of Honor, a drinking problem, and an obsession with death. Underhill and Walker discover the mutilated and strangled corpse of a young secretary. The trail leads to other murders, new and old, and a beautiful crippled district attorney named Lorna Weinberg.
Several familiar themes and characters from Ellroy's L.A. Quartet series appear here, such as police lieutenant Dudley Smith, Michael Breuning, and Richard Carlisle.
Ellroy's Clandestine earned him a Edgar Award nomination from Mystery Writers of America, in 1982.