Max Thursday, whose living is stirring things up, is forced to keep his hands in his pockets and try to stay away from corners so that he will not shoot his way out, when he is hired as a private eye to prove the innocence of a Chinese patriarch's son in a killing at San Diego's Joyland. Max, who can overlook the obvious in his anger to see justice done, turns up a double-barreled case for the police, and manages to keep his record clean. Rough.