Easy Rawlins is an black World War II veteran with few job prospects. At a bar, Easy meets DeWitt Albright, a mystical man searching for someone to investigate the disappearance of a missing white woman named Daphne Monet, who he suspects is currently hiding out in a few of the black jazz nightclubs of the city. Easy takes the work, but soon finds himself over his mind although confronting house payments and strapped for cash.