The hard-boiled detective novel is one that features a detective who is hired privately to investigate crimes, often by eccentrically wealthy people. They are considered “hard-boiled” because they typically do not follow conventional means of solving crimes, instead following their gut instinct and employing whatever methods they need. They often have what is referred to as their own “code of ethics,” breaking certain laws but refusing to break their own moral code. An author will often feature the same detective in several novels or stories, creating a history of their work in solving dozens of cases. While the most famous detective is Sherlock Holmes, first featured in Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s A Study in Scarlet (1887), Dashiell Hammett is credited with popularizing the “hard-boiled” aspect of detective fiction with his 1930 novel The Maltese Falcon (1930) and his character Sam Spade, who is featured in several other stories.

In The Devil and the Dark Water, Turton takes elements of the typical hard-boiled detective novel as the basis for his main characters, Sammy and Arent. They have worked together for years, solving dozens of cases for wealthy clients, with Arent awed by Sammy’s instincts and deductive reasoning.