Chicago Noir (Akashic Noir Anthologies)

Brooklyn Noir is on fire! It is an Edgar Award finalist for "The Book Signing" by Pete Hamill; winner of the MWA's Robert L. Fish Memorial Award for "Can't Catch Me" by Thomas Morrissey; a Shamus Award finalist for "Hasidic Noir" by Pearl Abraham; a Pushcart Prize finalist for "Practicing" by Ellen Miller; an Anthony Award finalist for "Hunter/Trapper" by Arthur Nersesian; an Anthony Award finalist for Best Cover Art.Brooklyn Noir stories "When All This Was Bay Ridge" by Tim McLoughlin and "Case Closed" by Lou Manfredo have both been selected for Best American Mystery Stories 2005 edited by Joyce Carol Oates and Otto Penzler."A collection of crime stories set in different Brooklyn neighborhoods, edited by Mr. McLoughlin...The stories are set far and wide in the borough, from Red Hook to Bushwick to Canarsie...Brooklyn has always occupied a special place in the imagination of America writers, who have been captivated by its raffishness."--New York Times"[An] anthology of 19 brand new hard-boiled and twisted tales, each set in a different Brooklyn neighborhood...the best stories concern people in the present coming to terms with the past."--Publisher’s Weekly"New York's punchiest borough asserts its criminal legacy with brand-new stories from a magnificent set of today's best writers. Brooklyn Noir moves from Coney Island to Bedford-Stuyvesant to Bay Ridge to Red Hook to Bushwick to Sheepshead Bay to Park Slope and far deeper, into the heart of Brooklyn's historical and criminal largesse, with all of its dark splendor."--Brooklyn Daily Eagle"Brooklyn Noir’s contributors are aware of their surroundings, literal and literary...Be cool: This pulp's got enough juice to keep the margaritas flowing."--Village Voice"It's all Brooklyn—Bensonhurst and Brighton Beach, Red Hook and Crown Heights—in this atmospheric collection of noir tales."--Booklist“This Brooklyn is cagey and unpredictable. This is about the shadowy corners, the musty old bars and the sidewalks littered with broken glass. In Brooklyn Noir, you can’t take anything for granted.”--Brooklyn Paper"A recent publication from Akashic Books is the laudable Brooklyn Noir, a collection of dark tales set in New York's self-proclaimed punchiest borough...the story by Peter Hamill is more than worth the price of the whole book."--New York Sun"718 represent!...Brooklyn Noir will make "you'se" leave the light on at night."--Metro"Brooklyn Noir is such a stunningly perfect combination that you can't believe you haven't read an anthology like this before. But trust me—you haven't. Story after story is a revelation, filled with the requisite sense of place, but also the perfect twists that crime stories demand. The writing is flat-out superb, filled with lines that will sing in your head for a long time to come."--Laura Lippman, winner of the Edgar, Shamus and Agatha awards"An excellent collection of Brooklyn stories that I urge everyone to read."--Marty Markowitz, Brooklyn Borough PresidentContributors include Pete Hamill, Nelson George, Sidney Offit, Arthur Nersesian, Pearl Abraham, Ellen Miller, Maggie Estep, Adam Mansbach, CJ Sullivan, Chris Niles, Norman Kelley, and many others.Akashic Books announces Brooklyn novelist Tim McLoughlin as the editor of the anthology (in addition to his contributing a story). McLoughlin's respect on any Brooklyn street predates the publication of his debut novel Heart of the Old Country (Akashic, 2001), a selection of the Barnes & Noble Discover Great New Writers Program that was hailed by Entertainment Weekly as "an inspired cross between Richard Price and Ross McDonald." For years, McLoughlin has worked in the Kings County Supreme Court in downtown Brooklyn. "The population of Chicago Noir is as diverse as any crowd at the lakefront fireworks show...As representative of Chicago as Oprah, MJ and a Gold Coast hot dog." --Chicago Sun-Times " Chicago Noir asks us to consider whether Chicago is, specifically, a noir city and, more significantly, how noir plays out in the current landscape...Its stories push us to think about how noir might still be relevant beyond a bad-ass sort of nostalgia." --American Book Review "Chicago shouts noir from the top of the Sears Tower to the nether regions of Wacker Drive, from the crime-ridden West Side to the moneyed taint of the North...Perhaps most impressive about Pollack's collection is the wide variety of writers selected to contribute." --Newcity "The stories that editor Pollack has chosen to represent his former hometown vary wildly in voices, approaches and style...New interpretations, juxtaposed with classic structures, bring together the different faces of North and South, old and new." --TimeOut Chicago "Marshaling the talents of eighteen award winning and acclaimed writers, most of whom have professional and/or personal ties to Chicago, Pollack . . . pays homage to the city that epitomizes the noir genre . . . Demonstrating crisp, riveting pacing, dialog redolent with sardonic despair, and dark, nihilistic atmosphere, nearly all the entries are stellar examples of noir at its best." --ForeWord "The latest urban noir anthology provides the audience with eighteen delightful tales that pay homage to the ethnic neighborhoods and to the sports teams." --Midwest Book Review " Chicago Noir is a highly readable story collection which offers numerous fresh, inventive takes on the well-worn noir genre . . . A very enjoyable effort overall." --Pete Lit " Chicago Noir is a legitimate heir to the noble literary tradition of the greatest city in America. Nelson Algren and James Farrell would be proud." --Stephen Elliott, author of Happy Baby "If ever a city was made to be the home of noir, its Chicago. These writers go straight to Chicagos noir heart." --Aleksandar Hemon, author of Nowhere Man Brand new stories Neal Pollack, Achy Obejas, Alexai Galaviz-Budziszewski, Adam Langer, Joe Meno, Peter Orner, Kevin Guilfoile, Bayo Ojikutu, Jeffery Renard Allen, Luciano Guerriero, Claire Zulkey, Andrew Ervin, M.K. Meyers, Todd Dills, C.J. Sullivan, Daniel Buckman, Amy Sayre-Roberts, and Jim Arndorfer. The city of Chicago has spent much time and money over the last decade marketing itself as a tourist-friendly place for the whole family. It's got a shiny new Millennium Park, a spaceship in the middle of Soldier Field, and thousands of identical faux-brick condo buildings that seem to spring from the ground overnight. Chicago's rough-and-tumble tough-guy reputation has been replaced by a postcard with a lake view. But that city's not gone. The hard-bitten streets once represented by James Farrell and Nelson Algren may have shifted locales, and they may be populated by different ethnicities, but Chicago is still a place where people struggle to survive and where, for many, crime is the only means for their survival. The stories in Chicago Noir reclaim that territory. Chicago Noir is populated by hired killers and jazz men, drunks and dreamers, corrupt cops and ticket scalpers and junkies. It's the Chicago that the Department of Tourism doesn't want you to see, a place where hard cases face their sad fates, and pay for their sins in blood. These are stories about blocks that visitors are afraid to walk. They tell of a Chicago beyond Oprah, Michael Jordan, and deep-dish pizza. This isn't someone's dream of Chicago. It's not even a nightmare. It's just the real city, unfiltered. Chicago Noir . Included in MTV.com's'These 17 Music-Themed YA Books Could Be Your Life'A selection of the Barnes & Noble Discover Great New Writers Program.'Meno gives his proverbial coming-of-age tale a punk-rock edge, as seventeen-year-old Chicagoan Brian Oswald tries to land his first girlfriend...Meno ably explores Brian's emotional uncertainty and his poignant youthful search for meaning...His gabby, heartfelt, and utterly believable take on adolescence strikes a winning chord.'--Publishers Weekly'A funny, hard-rocking first-person tale of teenage angst and discovery.'--Booklist'Captures the loose, fun, recklessness of midwestern punk.'--MTV.com'Captures both the sweetness and sting of adolescence with unflinching honesty.'--Entertainment Weekly'Joe Meno writes with the energy, honesty, and emotional impact of the best punk rock. From the opening sentence to the very last word, Hairstyles of the Damned held me in his grip.'--Jim DeRogatis, pop music critic, Chicago Sun-Times'The most authentic young voice since J.D. Salinger's Holden Caulfield...A darn good book.'--Daily Southtown'Sensitive, well-observed, often laugh-out-loud funny...You won't regret a moment of the journey.'--Chicago Tribune'Meno is a romantic at heart. Not the greeting card kind, or the Harlequin paperback version, but the type who thinks, deep down, that things matter, that art can change lives.'--Elgin Courier News'Funny and charming and sad and real. The adults are sparingly yet poignantly drawn, especially the fathers, who slip through without saying much but make a profound impression.'--Chicago Journal'Underneath his angst, Brian, the narrator of Hairstyles of the Damned, possesses a disarming sense of compassion which allows him to worm his way into the reader's heart. It is this simple contradiction that makes Meno's portrait of adolescence so convincing: He has dug up and displayed for us the secret paradox of the teenage years, the desire to belong pitted against the need for individuality--a constant clash of hate and love.'--NewPages.com'Joe Meno knows Chicago's south side the way Jane Goodall knew chimps and apes--which is to say, he really knows it. He also knows about the early'90s, punk rock, and awkward adolescence. Best of all, he knows the value of entertainment. Hairstyles of the Damned is proof positive.'--John McNally, author of The Book of Ralph'Filled with references to dozens of bands and mix-tape set lists, the book's heart and soul is driven by a teenager's life-changing discovery of punk's social and political message...Meno's alter ego, Brian Oswald, is a modern-day Holden Caulfield...It's a funny, sweet, and, at times, hard-hitting story with a punk vibe.'--Mary Houlihan, Chicago Sun-Times'Meno's language is rhythmic and honest, expressing things proper English never could. And you've got to hand it to the author, who pulled off a very good trick: The book is punk rock. It's not just punk rock. It's not just about punk rock; it embodies the idea of punk rock; it embodies the idea of punk--it's pissed off at authority, it won't groom itself properly, and it irritates. Yet its rebellious spirit is inspiring and right on the mark.'--SF WeeklyHairstyles of the Damned is the debut novel of our Punk Planet Books imprint, which originates from Punk Planet magazine.Hairstyles of the Damned is an honest, true-life depiction of growing up punk on Chicago's south side: a study in the demons of racial intolerance, Catholic school conformism, and class repression. It is the story of the riotous exploits of Brian, a high school burnout, and "I'm an LA native with a lot of love for LA crime fiction, but instead of preaching to the noir choir about The Long Goodbye , I'd like to gush about Southland by Nina Revoyr. It's a brilliant, ambitious, moving literary crime novel about two families in South Los Angeles and their tangled history between the 1930s and the 1990s. The central mystery is the death of four black boys in a Japanese-American man's store during the Watts Rebellion of 1965. It's a powerful book, one that I think about often, as well as a huge influence on my work. Right up there with Chandler." -- Stephanie Cha (of the LARB ) in GQ on "The Greatest Crime Novelists on Their Favorite Crime Novels Ever" "A story about injustice dressed up as a detective novel, Southland reminds us that activism is both an ongoing project and a deeply personal choice." -- Vallaire Wallace in Electric Lit on "The Novel That Shows Us How to Face our Past to Change Our Future" "Jackie Ishida's grandfather had a store in Watts where four boys were killed during the riots in 1965, a mystery she attempts to solve." -- New York Times Book Review , Ross MacDonald on "Where Noir Lives in the City of Angels" "It is the kind of saga that often epitomizes and shocks LA--friction and violence between races and cultures." -- Los Angeles Times , named one of the 20 Essential LA Crime Books "When I started working on Your House Will Pay , I hoped to write something that was half as smart and affecting as Southland . Revoyr's novel takes place in the Crenshaw district of Los Angeles, following two families--one black, one Japanese--over several decades. It's a character-driven saga with the engine of a crime novel, unravelling a horrific multiple murder that took place in the chaotic days of the Watts Rebellion in 1965." -- The Guardian (UK), one of Steph Cha's Top 10 Books About Trouble in Los Angeles "[A]n absolutely compelling story of family and racial tragedy. Revoyr's novel is honest in detailing southern California's brutal history, and honorable in showing how families survived with love and tenacity and dignity." -- Susan Straight, author of Highwire Moon Southland brings us a fascinating story of race, love, murder and history, against the backdrop of an ever-changing Los Angeles. A young Japanese-American woman, Jackie Ishida, is in her last semester of law school when her grandfather, Frank Sakai, dies unexpectedly. While trying to fulfill a request from his will, Jackie discovers that four African-American boys were killed in the store Frank owned during the Watts Riots of 1965. Along with James Lanier, a cousin of one of the victims, Jackie tries to piece together the story of the boys' deaths. In the process, she unearths the long-held secrets of her family's history. Southland depicts a young woman in the process of learning that her own history has bestowed upon her a deep obligation to be engaged in the larger world. And in Frank Sakai and his African-American friends, it presents characters who find significant common ground in their struggles, but who also engage each other across grounds--historical and cultural--that are still very much in dispute. Moving in and out of the past--from the internment camps of World War II, to the barley fields of the Crenshaw District in the 1930s, to the streets of Watts in the 1960s, to the night spots and garment factories of the 1990s-- Southland weaves a tale of Los Angeles in all of its faces and forms. Brand new stories Domenic Stansberry, Barry Gifford, Eddie Muller, Robert Mailer Anderson, Michelle Tea, Peter Plate, Kate Braverman, David Corbett, Alejandro Murgua, Sin Soracco, Alvin Lu, Jon Longhi, Will Christopher Baer, Jim Nesbit, and David Henry Sterry. San Francisco Noir lashes out with hard-biting, all-original tales exploring the shadowy nether regions of scenic "Baghdad by the Bay." Virtuosos of the genre meet up with the best of S.F.'s literary fiction community to chart a unique psycho-geography for a dark landscape. From inner city boroughs to the outlands, each contributor offers an original story based in a distinct neighborhood. At times brutal, darkly humorous, and revelatory--the stories speak of a hidden San Francisco, a town where the fog is but a prelude to darker realities lingering beneath. "An entertaining anthology of overheated short stories by local writers...Here the city becomes the central character, the strongest on the page." --San Francisco Chronicle "Reflecting changing conditions, multicultural authors are well represented here, and female writers definitely make their mark...There's enough here to cause us to want more." --Library Journal "Take an intermission from your Hitchcock marathon, and turn instead to the 15 stories between the covers of San Francisco Noir for the SF-based suspense you crave. Luring you deep into the criminal heritage of your own backyard, each piece of the collection transcends the traditional elements of noir and helps redefine the moody genre." --77 Magazine "The protagonists of noir fiction have their own agendas, but for readers much of the pleasure is unraveling the mystery and deciphering the clues that constitute a city, and if there is a love story in noir writing its the passion of writers, readers, and protagonists for the gritty geographical details. As the bodies drop in the strong stories here, steep, fog-wrapped, fratricidal San Francisco comes here are old neighborhoods, bars, bookstores, the famous and then forgotten landlord arson at 16th and Valencia, buried streams, streetcars, parks, a lost city and the new city haunting almost every page of this gorgeous anthology of San Francisco noir." --Rebecca Solnit "I was wondering about the city's shadowside that the guides didn't show. These top writers are of the 'As bad as it gets' brand, and then worse. If you like puke, fear & loathing caused by stray bullets, happenstance getting the hero who is an anti-hero really, a male corpse rotting in the bathtub while the woman poops in the garden, the Reverend Christmas shot in the ear by the PO-lice, then this is your good read for a murky, maybe even gritty, weekend." --Janwillem van de Wetering "San Francisco has long been a city of back alleys and black figures; this is its romantic map." --Michael Ray, Editor, Zoetrope All-Story

Brand new stories by: Domenic Stansberry, Barry Gifford, Eddie Muller, Robert Mailer Anderson, Michelle Tea, Peter Plate, Kate Braverman, David Corbett, Alejandro Murguía, Sin Soracco, Alvin Lu, Jon Longhi, Will Christopher Baer, Jim Nesbit, and David Henry Sterry.

San Francisco Noir lashes out with hard-biting, all-original tales exploring the shadowy nether regions of scenic "Baghdad by the Bay." Virtuosos of the genre meet up with the best of S.F.'s literary fiction community to chart a unique psycho-geography for a dark landscape.

From inner city boroughs to the outlands, each contributor offers an original story based in a distinct neighborhood. At times brutal, darkly humorous, and revelatory--the stories speak of a hidden San Francisco, a town where the fog is but a prelude to darker realities lingering beneath.

“The protagonists of noir fiction have their own agendas, but for readers much of the pleasure is unraveling the mystery and deciphering the clues that constitute a city, and if there is a love story in noir writing it’s the passion of writers, readers, and protagonists for the gritty geographical details. As the bodies drop in the strong stories here, steep, fog-wrapped, fratricidal San Francisco comes alive: here are old neighborhoods, bars, bookstores, the famous and then forgotten landlord arson at 16th and Valencia, buried streams, streetcars, parks, a lost city and the new city haunting almost every page of this gorgeous anthology of San Francisco noir.” —Rebecca Solnit

“I was wondering about the city’s shadowside that the guides didn’t show. These top writers are of the ‘As bad as it gets’ brand, and then worse. If you like puke, fear & loathing caused by stray bullets, happenstance getting the hero who is an anti-hero really, a male corpse rotting in the bathtub while the woman poops in the garden, the Reverend Christmas shot in the ear by the PO-lice, then this is your good read for a murky, maybe even gritty, weekend.” —Janwillem van de Wetering

“San Francisco has long been a city of back alleys and black figures; this is its romantic map.” —Michael Ray, Editor, Zoetrope All-Story

“Chicago Noir is a legitimate heir to the noble literary tradition of the greatest city in America. Nelson Algren and James Farrell would be proud.” —Stephen Elliott, author of Happy Baby

“If ever a city was made to be the home of noir, it’s Chicago. These writers go straight to Chicago’s noir heart.” —Aleksandar Hemon, author of Nowhere Man

Brand new stories by: Neal Pollack, Achy Obejas, Alexai Galaviz-Budziszewski, Adam Langer, Joe Meno, Peter Orner, Kevin Guilfoile, Bayo Ojikutu, Jeff Allen, Luciano Guerriero, Claire Zulkey, Andrew Ervin, M.K. Meyers, Todd Dills, C.J. Sullivan, Daniel Buckman, Amy Sayre-Roberts, and Jim Arndorfer.

The city of Chicago has spent much time and money over the last decade marketing itself as a tourist-friendly place for the whole family. It's got a shiny new Millennium Park, a spaceship in the middle of Soldier Field, and thousands of identical faux-brick condo buildings that seem to spring from the ground overnight. Chicago's rough-and-tumble tough-guy reputation has been replaced by a postcard with a lake view.

But that city's not gone. The hard-bitten streets once represented by James Farrell and Nelson Algren may have shifted locales, and they may be populated by different ethnicities, but Chicago is still a place where people struggle to survive and where, for many, crime is the only means for their survival. The stories in Chicago Noir reclaim that territory.

Chicago Noir is populated by hired killers and jazzmen, drunks and dreamers, corrupt cops and ticket scalpers and junkies. It's the Chicago that the Department of Tourism doesn't want you to see, a place where hard cases face their sad fates, and pay for their sins in blood. These are stories about blocks that visitors are afraid to walk. They tell of a Chicago beyond Oprah, Michael Jordan, and deep-dish pizza. This isn't someone's dream of Chicago. It's not even a nightmare. It's just the real city, unfiltered. Chicago Noir.

"[A]n absolutely compelling story of family and racial tragedy. Revoyr’s novel is honest in detailing southern California’s brutal history, and honorable in showing how families survived with love and tenacity and dignity."—Susan Straight, author of Highwire Moon

Southland brings us a fascinating story of race, love, murder and history, against the backdrop of an ever-changing Los Angeles. A young Japanese-American woman, Jackie Ishida, is in her last semester of law school when her grandfather, Frank Sakai, dies unexpectedly. While trying to fulfill a request from his will, Jackie discovers that four African-American boys were killed in the store Frank owned during the Watts Riots of 1965. Along with James Lanier, a cousin of one of the victims, Jackie tries to piece together the story of the boys’ deaths. In the process, she unearths the long-held secrets of her family’s history.

Southland depicts a young woman in the process of learning that her own history has bestowed upon her a deep obligation to be engaged in the larger world. And in Frank Sakai and his African-American friends, it presents characters who find significant common ground in their struggles, but who also engage each other across grounds—historical and cultural—that are still very much in dispute.

Moving in and out of the past—from the internment camps of World War II, to the barley fields of the Crenshaw District in the 1930s, to the streets of Watts in the 1960s, to the night spots and garment factories of the 1990s—Southland weaves a tale of Los Angeles in all of its faces and forms.

Nina Revoyr is the author of The Necessary Hunger ("Irresistible."—Time Magazine). She was born in Japan, raised in Tokyo and Los Angeles, and is of Japanese and Polish-American descent. She lives and works in Los -Angeles.

The debut novel from Akashic's new imprint, PUNK PLANET BOOKS!

Publishers Weekly

Meno (How the Hula Girl Sings) gives his proverbial coming-of-age tale a punk-rock edge, as 17-year-old Chicagoan Brian Oswald tries to land his first girlfriend and make it through high school. Brian loves video games, metal music and his best friend, Gretchen, an overweight, foul-mouthed, pink-haired badass famous for beating up other girls. Gretchen, meanwhile, loves the Ramones and the Clash and 26-year-old white power thug Tony Degan. Gretchen keeps Brian at bay even as their friendship starts to bloom into a romance, forcing him to find comfort with the fetching but slatternly Dorie. Typical adolescent drama reigns: Brian's parents are having marital problems, he needs money to buy wheels (I needed a van because, like Mike always said, guys with vans always got the most trim, after the guys who could grow mustaches), he experiments with sex and vandalism. Meno ably explores Brian's emotional uncertainty and his poignant youthful search for meaning, both in music and in his on-again, off-again situation with Gretchen; his gabby, heartfelt and utterly believable take on adolescence strikes a winning chord. Meno also deals honestly with teenage violence-though Gretchen's fights have a certain slapstick quality, Brian's occasional bouts of anger and destruction seem very real. He's a sympathetic narrator and a prime example of awkward adolescence, even if he doesn't have much of a plot crafted around him. Author tour. (Sept.) Forecast: This B&N Discover pick will appeal to alterna-adolescents and adults alike. Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.

Alicia is a smart, confident and gorgeous prostitute in Havana. She is not a street-walker. Rather, she displays her wares on bicycle, seducing men through the irresistible pull of her fine derrière. John King, her new client, is a Canadian businessman with a striking resemblance to movie star Alain Delon. This is no ordinary “John” and Alicia's feelings for him grow; she sees in their relationship the possibility of escape from her dead-end life in a Havana plagued with scarcity. When John King’s wealthy and sexually deviant boss is suddenly killed, Alicia and John hatch a get-rich-quick scheme. A web of deception is woven, but just as quickly unraveled disastrously, and only one person is able to say "adiós” to the dilapidated island of Cuba.

Daniel Chavarría was born in Uruguay in 1933. He spent the 1960s involved in several South American liberation struggles. He fled the continent and settled in Havana, Cuba, where he has resided since 1969. From 1975 to 1986, Chavarría worked as a translator of literature into Spanish, and taught Latin, Greek and Classical Literature at the University of Havana. His novels, short stories, literary journalism, and screenplays have reached audiences across Latin America, Europe, and Asia. Chavarría has won numerous literary awards around the world, including a 1992 Dashiell Hammett Award. Adiós Muchachos is his first novel to be translated into English. In 2002, Akashic Books will publish his mystery novel, The Eye of Cybele, set in ancient Greece.

Winner of the 2002 Edgar Allan Poe Award for Best Paperback Original.

"The novel describes the ill-fated alliance between Alicia, a stunningly beautiful prostitute who openly displays her voluptuous wares by bicycle on the city streets, and Victor King, a desperately ambitious Canadian businessman with an enormous appetite for kinky sex and buried treasure - and a striking resemblance to Mel Gibson.". "Following an early erotic entanglement of their own, Victor hires Alicia to lure a series of handsome lovers into the bedroom of his estate for the voyeuristic gratification of his mysterious wife, Elizabeth, who watches the action with her husband through a two-way mirror. After a sultry drunken dance results in the accidental death of Victor's wealthy Dutch business partner, Rieks Groote, Victor sees his ambitions for wealth suddenly go up in smoke and Alicia faces the end to her dreams of escaping her dreary, dead-end life on the island.". "Hustlers all the way, the two quickly decide to turn disaster into opportunity, hiding the body in a freezer and hatching an elaborate kidnapping scheme that will allow them to steal millions of dollars from the Groote family and start a new life together off the island. Through a series of startling plot twists and slapstick misadventures, Victor and Alicia find themselves unwittingly manipulated and ultimately outmaneuvered by a sympathetic fellow hustler. In the end, everything revolves around the secret ingredient to an old family recipe and a long-overdue nose job - as only one of the novel's characters is able to make off with the loot and bid adios to Cuba and the past."--BOOK JACKET. New York's punchiest borough asserts its criminal legacy with all new stories from a magnificent set of today's best writers. Brooklyn Noir moves from Coney Island to Bedford-Stuyvesant to Bay Ridge to Red Hook to Bushwick to Sheepshead Bay to Park Slope and far deeper, into the heart of Brooklyn's historical and criminal largesse, with all of its dark splendor. Each contributor presents a brand new story set in a distinct neighborhood. Brooklyn Noir mixes masters of the mystery genre with the best of New York's literary fiction community-and, of course, leaves room for new blood. These brilliant and chilling stories see crime striking in communities of Russians, Jamaicans, Hasidic Jews, Puerto Ricans, Italians, Irish and many other ethnicities-in the most diverse urban location on the planet. Contributors include Pete Hamill, Nelson George, Sidney Offit, Arthur Nersesian, Pearl Abraham, Ellen Miller, Maggie Estep, Adam Mansbach, CJ Sullivan, Chris Niles, Norman Kelley, and many others. Akashic Books announces Brooklyn novelist Tim McLoughlin as the editor of the anthology (in addition to his contributing a story). McLoughlin's respect on any Brooklyn street predates the publication of his debut novel Heart of the Old Country (Akashic, 2001), a selection of the Barnes & Noble Discover Great New Writers Program that was hailed by Entertainment Weekly as "an inspired cross between Richard Price and Ross McDonald." For years, McLoughlin has worked in the Kings County Supreme Court in downtown Brooklyn. On the heels of the stunning success of the Summer '04 award-winning bestseller Brooklyn Noir, this second volume digs deeper into the criminal history of New York's punchiest and most alluring borough. Brooklyn Noir 2 offers short stories by the classic authors who blazed the path for the success of the first volume, which award-winning mystery author Laura Lippman called, "a stunningly perfect combination . . . the writing is flat-out superb, filled with lines that will sing in your head for a long time to come." Brooklyn Noir was featured in every media outlet in New York City (including two New York Times features and an appearance on the Leonard Lopate NPR radio show), as well as publications and media all across the country (and the UK, Australia, Italy, etc.). Once again in Brooklyn Noir 2 , each story is set in a distinct Brooklyn neighborhood and mixes masters of genre with some of the best literary fiction writers to ever set foot in the borough. These brilliant and chilling stories see crime striking in communities of Russians, Jamaicans, Puerto Ricans, Italians, Irish, and many other ethnicities--in the most diverse urban location on the planet. Contributors: H.P. Lovecraft, Lawrence Block, Donald Westlake, Pete Hamill, Jonathan Lethem, Colson Whitehead, Carolyn Wheat, Thomas Wolfe, Hubert Selby, Jr., Stanley Ellin, Gilbert Sorrentino, Maggie Estep, Salvatore La Puma, and Irwin Shaw. "Nina Revoyr brings us a compelling story of race, love, murder and history against the backdrop of Los Angeles. A young Japanese-American woman, Jackie Ishida, is in her last semester of law school when her grandfather, Frank Sakai, dies unexpectedly. Frank was a veteran of World War II who, many years before, had owned a store in the Crenshaw district, one of the first racially mixed areas in the city and now the heart of L.A.'s black community. While trying to fulfill a request from his will, Jackie discovers that four black teenagers were killed in the store during the Watts Riots of 1965--and that the murders were never solved or reported. Along with James Lanier, a cousin of one of the victims, she tries to piece together the story of the boys' deaths. In the process, Jackie unearths the long-held secrets of her family's history--and her own. Southland explores the fragile understandings and sometimes painful misunderstandings that occur across the lines of race and culture. It is also the story of an ever-changing city. Moving in and out of the past, from the shipping yards and internment camps of World War II; to the barley fields of the Crenshaw district in the 1930s; to the mean streets of Watts in the 1960s; to the night spots and garment factories of the 1990s, Southland weaves a tale of Los Angeles in all of its faces and forms." -- From back cover “If ever a city was made to be the home of noir, it's Chicago. These writers go straight to Chicago's noir heart” (Aleksandar Hemon, National Book Award finalist and New York Times–bestselling author of The Lazarus Project). Chicago's rough-and-tumble tough-guy reputation may have been replaced in recent years by the image of a tourist- and family-friendly town—but that original city isn't gone. The hard-bitten streets once represented by James Farrell and Nelson Algren may have shifted locales, and they may be populated by different ethnicities, but Chicago is still a place where people struggle to survive and where, for many, crime is the only means for their survival. The stories in Chicago Noir reclaim that territory, in tales of hired killers and jazz men, drunks and dreamers, corrupt cops and ticket scalpers and junkies, of a place where hard cases face their sad fates, and pay for their sins in blood. Brand new stories by Neal Pollack, Achy Obejas, Alexai Galaviz-Budziszewski, Adam Langer, Joe Meno, Peter Orner, Kevin Guilfoile, Bayo Ojikutu, Jeffery Renard Allen, Luciano Guerriero, Claire Zulkey, Andrew Ervin, M.K. Meyers, Todd Dills, C.J. Sullivan, Daniel Buckman, Amy Sayre-Roberts, and Jim Arndorfer. “Chicago Noir is a legitimate heir to the noble literary tradition of the greatest city in America.” —Stephen Elliott, author of Happy Baby This Edgar Award–winning crime novel offers “pulp fiction in Castro's Cuba” (Martin Cruz Smith, author The Girl from Venice). Alicia is a smart, confident, and gorgeous prostitute in Havana. She is not a streetwalker. Rather, she displays her wares on bicycle, seducing men through the irresistible pull of her fine derrière. John King, her new client, is a Canadian businessman with a striking resemblance to movie star Alain Delon. This is no ordinary john, and as Alicia's feelings for him grow, she sees in their relationship the possibility of escape from her dead-end life in a city plagued with scarcity. So when King's wealthy and sexually deviant boss is suddenly killed, Alicia and John hatch a get-rich-quick scheme. A web of deception is woven—but it will be quickly and disastrously unraveled, and only one person will be able to say adiós to the dilapidated island of Cuba... “Fun, fast, and intelligent... A madcap caper full of twisted sex, devious schemes and high-rolling hijinks... Will leave readers clamoring for more.” —Publishers Weekly “The book's cynical take on ambition and greed is tempered by humor and humanity.” —The New York Times “Impossible to put down. This is a great read.” —Library Journal This award-winning anthology of original crime fiction exploring Brooklyn's many enclaves features new stories by Pete Hamill, Maggie Estep and others.New York's punchiest borough asserts its criminal legacy with this collection of stories from some of today's best writers. Brooklyn Noir moves from Coney Island to Bedford-Stuyvesant to Bay Ridge to Red Hook to Bushwick to Sheepshead Bay to Park Slope and far deeper, into the heart of Brooklyn's historical and criminal largesse. Each contributor offers a new story set in a distinct neighborhood. Many of the stories that first appeared in this volume have garnered critical acclaim, including Pete Hamill's Edgar Award finalist “The Book Signing”; Ellen Miller's Pushcart Prize finalist “Practicing”; Pearl Abraham's Shamus Award finalist “Hasidic Noir”; Arthur Nersesian's Anthony Award finalist “Hunter/Trapper”; and Thomas Morrissey's Robert L. Fish Memorial Award-winner “Can't Catch Me”.Brooklyn Noir also features brand-new stories by Nelson George, Sidney Offit, Neal Pollack, Ken Bruen, Maggie Estep, Kenji Jasper, Adam Mansbach, C.J. Sullivan, Chris Niles, Norman Kelley, Nicole Blackman, Tim McLoughlin, Lou Manfredo, Luciano Guerriero, and Robert Knightley. This anthology of classic noir set in NYC's County of Kings features stories by Thomas Wolfe, Lawrence Block, Maggie Estep and more. On the heels of the award-winning bestseller Brooklyn Noir—a collection of all-new Brooklyn-based crime fiction—this second volume digs deeper into the criminal history of New York's punchiest and most alluring borough. Brooklyn Noir 2 offers classic short stories by the authors who blazed the path for the success of the first volume. Each story is set in a distinct Brooklyn neighborhood and mixes masters of genre with some of the best literary fiction authors to ever set foot in the borough. These brilliant and chilling stories explore crime among Brooklyn's Russian, Jamaican, Puerto Rican, Italian, and Irish, communities, among other enclaves in this diverse and distinctly crooked borough.Brooklyn Noir 2 features entries by H.P. Lovecraft, Lawrence Block, Donald Westlake, Pete Hamill, Jonathan Lethem, Colson Whitehead, Carolyn Wheat, Thomas Wolfe, Hubert Selby, Jr., Stanley Ellin, Gilbert Sorrentino, Maggie Estep, Salvatore La Puma, and Irwin Shaw. Nina Revoyr brings us a compelling story of race, love, murder, and history against the backdrop of Los Angeles. A young Japanese-American woman, Jackie Ishida, is in her last semester of law school when her grandfather, Frank Sakai, dies unexpectedly. While trying to fulfill a request from his will, Jackie discovers that 4 black teenagers were killed in the store he ran during the Watts Riots of 1965—and that the murders were never solved or reported. Along with James Lanier, a cousin of one of the victims, she tries to piece together the story of the boys' deaths. In the process, Jackie unearths the long-held secrets of her family's history—and her own. Moving in and out of the past, from the shipping yards and internment camps of World War II; to the barley fields of the Crenshaw District in the 1930s; to the means streets of Watts in the 1960s; to the night spots and garment factories of the 1990s, Southland weaves a tale of L.A. in all of its faces and forms. La 4ème de couv. indique : "In Southland, her award-winning second novel, Nina Revoyr brings us a compelling story of race, love, murder, and history against the backdrop of Los Angeles. A young Japanese-american woman, Jackie Ishida, is in her last semester of law school when her grandfather, Frank Sakai, dies unexpectedly. Frank was a veteran of World War II who, many years before, had owned a store in the Crenshaw district, one of the first racially mixed areas in the city and now the heart of L.A.'s black community. While trying to fulfill a request from his will, Jackie discovers that four black teenagers were killed in the store during the Watts Riots of 1965 - and that the murders were never solved or reported. Along with James Lanier, a cousin of one of the victims, she tries to piece together the story of the boys' deaths. In the process, Jackie unearths the long-held secrets of her family's history - and her own." This anthology of “genuinely haunting noir fiction” set in the Golden City features new stories by Jim Nisbet, Alejandro Murguía, Michelle Tea and others (Publishers Weekly). Oscar Wilde once quipped that anyone who disappears is said to be seen in in San Francisco. With its famous fog, winding streets, and hazardously steep hills, it is certainly an ideal place for getting lost. It's also an ideal setting for noir fiction. From Fisherman's Warf and The Golden Gate Bridge to The Haight-Ashbury, Chinatown, and Russian Hill, fifteen authors explore the sordid side of the City by the Bay in this sterling collection. San Francisco Noir features brand-new stories by Barry Gifford, Robert Mailer Anderson, Michelle Tea, Peter Plate, Kate Braverman, Domenic Stansberry, David Corbett, Eddie Muller, Alejandro Murguía, Sin Soracco, Alvin Lu, John Longhi, Will Christopher Baer, Jim Nisbet, and David Henry Sterry. Brand-new stories by: Neal Pollack, Achy Obejas, Alexai Galaviz-Budziszewski, Adam Langer, Joe Meno, Peter Orner, Kevin Guilfoile, Bayo Ojikutu, Jeff Allen, Claire Zulkey, Andrew Ervin, M.K. Meyers, Todd Dills, Daniel Buckman, and others.The City of Chicago has spent much time and money over the last decade marketing itself as a tourist-friendly place for the whole family . . . But, the hard-bitten streets once represented by James Farrell and Nelson Algren are not gone; they may have shifted locales, and they may be populated by different ethnicities, but Chicago is still a place where people struggle to survive and where, for many, crime is the only means for their survival.Chicago Noir is populated by hired killers and jazzmen, drunks and dreamers, corrupt cops and ticket scalpers and junkies. It's the Chicago that the Department of Tourism doesn't want you to see . . . Masters Of The Mystery Genre And The Best Of New York's Literary Fiction Community Come Together In An Anthology Of Stories, Each Set In A Distinct Neighborhood Of Brooklyn. The Book Signing / Pete Hamill -- Hasidic Noir / Pearl Abraham -- No Time For Senior's / Sidney Offit -- When All This Was Bay Ridge / Tim Mcloughin -- Practicing / Ellen Miller -- Crown Heist / Adam Mansbach -- Hunter/trapper / Arthur Nersesian -- New Lots Avenue / Nelson George -- Scavenger Hunt / Neal Pollack -- The Code / Norman Kelley -- Can't Catch Me / Thomas Morrissey -- Case Closed / Lou Manfredo -- Eating Italian / Luciano Guerriero -- Thursday / Kenji Jasper -- One More For The Road / Robert Knightly -- Triple Harrison / Maggie Estep -- Fade To-- Brooklyn / Ken Bruen -- Dumped / Nicole Blackman -- Slipping Into Darkness / C.j. Sullivan -- Ladies' Man / Chris Niles. Edited By Tim Mcloughlin. Brand-new stories by: Barry Gifford, Robert Mailer Anderson, Michelle Tea, Peter Plate, Kate Braverman, Domenic Stansberry, David Corbett, Eddie Muller, Alejandro Murguia, Sin Sorracco, Alvin Lu, John Longhi, Will Christopher Baer, Jim Nisbet, and David Henry Sterry.San Francisco Noir lashes out with hard-biting tales exploring the shadowy nether regions of scenic "Baghdad by the Bay." In this superb collection, virtuosos of the genre meet up with the best of S.F.'s literary fiction community to chart a unique psycho-geography for a dark landscape.From inner city boroughs to the outlands, each contributor offers an original story based in a distinct neighborhood. At times brutal, darkly humorous, and revelatory—the stories speak of a hidden San Francisco, a town where the fog is but a prelude to darker realities lingering beneath. Hairstyles of the Damned is an honest, true-life depiction of growing up punk on Chicago's south side: a study in the demons of racial intolerance, Catholic school conformism, and class repression. It is the story of the riotous exploits of Brian, a high school burnout, and his best friend, Gretchen, a punk rock girl fond of brawling. Based on the actual events surrounding a Chicago high school's segregated prom, this work of fiction unflinchingly pursues the truth in discovering what it means to be your own person."Joe Meno writes with the energy, honesty, and emotional impact of the best punk rock. From the opening sentence to the very last word, Hairstyles of the Damned held me in his grip."—Jim DeRogatis, pop music critic, Chicago Sun-Times "Hairstyles of the Damned is an honest and affectionate depiction of wanting to belong, but never quite belonging. Joe Meno's pitch-perfect prose illuminates the tumultuous realities of American adolescence, the disintegration of the modern family, and the way a mistake can change a person's life. Following the riotous exploits of Brian, a Catholic school malcontent, and his best friend Gretchen, a punk rock girl fond of brawling, this work of fiction pursues the truth in discovering what it means to develop your own identity."--BOOK JACKET. Fiction. Latin/Latina Studies. In Havana, Cuba, a beautiful young woman rides a bicycle through the city streets to lure men into her "services". Desperate to escape her dead-end life in a city plagued with scarcity, the luscious bicyclist designs a get-rich-quick scheme with a gorgeous john from Canada. A web of deception is woven and then disastrously unraveled Jackie Ishida, a young Japanese American woman living in Los Angeles, learns of the deaths of four young men in her grandfather's store during the 1965 Watts riot, and sets out to discover the truth about their deaths, along the way uncovering some long-buried family secrets as well. Gretchen and Brian struggle to fit in at their Catholic school on Chicago's south side. Both teenagers listen to punk rock and have haircuts that clash with the conservative style of the 1990s. As their school year progresses, they learn the value of individualism over conformity This second volume of "Brooklyn noir" presents an anthology of chilling stories, each set in a distinct neighborhood of Brooklyn, featuring contributions by such noted crime and mystery writers as Pete Hamill, H.P. Lovecraft, Donald Westlake, Irwin Shaw, and Maggie Estep San Francisco Noir lashes out with original hard-biting tales exploring the shadowy nether regions of scenic "Baghdad by the Bay." Desperation, transgression, and madness fuel these tales celebrating San Francisco's criminal heritage.