Things aren't always what they appear to be. Sometimes you see things as you were programmed to see them and react according to society's training. That is the belief of Derek Strange, Black private investigator and ex-cop, while he toils on his latest case. Hired to open a closed investigation by Leona Wilson, mother of Chris Wilson, a Black police officer killed in line of duty by another cop, he soon finds the investigation leads into a spider web of leads. Leona believes Derek can go deep into the incident to show Chris was not at fault for his own death.

On the night of the killing, Chris pinned an innocent man on the ground and held a gun to his head. White Officer Terry Quinn and his partner arrived on the scene to see a Black man holding a gun on a White man. With all the tension, Quinn indicated that Chris never identified himself as a cop and was shot when he turned the gun toward the officers. On autopsy, Chris's blood alcohol level came back positive. A White cop shoots an off-duty Black cop, and much negative publicity, accusations, and racial questions follow. Quinn was cleared by the department but never by the publicity, so he quits the DC police force to work in a used bookstore; and Chris's name remains under a gray haze of innuendo.

While Strange is taking a ride with Quinn to discuss the incident, Strange gets a call to pick up a bail jumper. Quinn distracts the brother of the jumper by violently knocking him out --- and realizes he enjoys this and has been missing the adrenaline rush. Quinn then asks Strange to be involved in this investigation, one that takes them into the heart of drug operations run among Hispanics, rednecks, and Blacks, all of whom seem to have mockery for each other.

Pelecanos develops many issues related to socialization. Primarily, Quinn being programmed since birth to expect a Black man holding a gun on a White man is up to no good. Quinn didn't listen and didn't use his police powers of deduction; all he saw was a Black man with a gun, a criminal, and made up his mind to fire. Would he have pulled the trigger on a White man?

The issue of stereotypical images, based upon outward color, is one often played out in entertainment and reality. In RIGHT AS RAIN, the idea is developed from the onset when Quinn dates a half-Black and half-Puerto Rican woman and believes it is due to her physical beauty. Before the shooting, he had been raised fearful of neighborhoods that are on the opposite side of town. He was taught not to expect mixing or interracial dating. This sudden interest in a non-White woman evolves from his insistence that the shooting did not occur because of the Black and White issue, but because he feared for his life. Is he trying to make a point to the masses or to himself?

Related issues include becoming criminal as an accident of birth and environment, where kids have drug dealers as their only examples and are forced to work for them to get what television says you should have and to lessen the gap between the haves and the have-nots. Pelecanos mentions ideas of legalizing drugs and banning guns to solve the problems of this society as he illustrates that racial problems and illegal drugs are not confined to poor neighborhoods.

Secondary issues, dealing with relationships and fear of commitment, tend to add additional intensity to these characters' lives. The social commentary upon which Pelecanos bases his story may enlighten the portion of the world that reads quality fiction, but what of the masses that don't read or find reading difficult?