A Cool Million presents the dismantling of Lemuel Pitkin, piece by piece. As a satire of the Horatio Alger myth of success, the novel is evocative of Voltaire's Candide, which satirized the philosophical optimism of Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz and Alexander Pope. Pitkin is a typical Schlemiel, stumbling from one situation to the next; he gets robbed, cheated, unjustly arrested, frequently beaten and exploited.

Nathanael West (born Nathan Weinstein; October 17, 1903 - December 22, 1940) was an American author and screenwriter. He is remembered for two darkly satirical novels: Miss Lonelyhearts (1933) and The Day of the Locust (1939), set respectively in the newspaper and Hollywood film industries.