DC Noir (Akashic Noir Anthologies) - Softcover

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1888451904 ISBN 13: 9781888451900

Publisher: Akashic Books, 2005

Synopsis

Brand new stories by: George Pelecanos, James Grady, Kenji Jasper, Jim Beane, Jabari Asim, Ruben Castaneda, James Patton, Norman Kelley, Jennifer Howard, Richard Currey, Lester Irby, and others.

Mystery sensation Pelecanos pens the lead story and edits this groundbreaking collection of stories detailing the seedy underside of the nation's capital. This is not an anthology of ill-conceived and inauthentic political thrillers. Instead, in D.C. Noir, pimps, whores, gangsters, and con-men run rampant in zones of this city that most never hear about.

"From the Chevy Chase housewife who commits a shocking act to the watchful bum protecting Georgetown street vendors, the tome offers a startling glimpse into the cityscape's darkest corners...Fans of the [noir] genre will find solid writing, palpable tension and surprise endings."
—Washington Post

"Every story in this all-original noir anthology set in the nation's capital is well-written."
—Publishers Weekly

"Imbued with countless collective years of local experience."
—Washington City Paper

"[Pelecanos] has assembled a compelling mix of ex-convicts, retired police officers, former crime beat reporters and a few writing pros willing to turn their storytelling eye, whether jaundiced or tender, inward toward the neighborhood...Local haunts and hangouts are lovingly drawn."
—Washington Times

"Pick up a copy of the book D.C. Noir...and prepare to be transported to a different D.C. that the tourists see...Pure Washingtonian."
—Washingtonian

"Those looking for redemption in humanity would do well to look elsewhere, but this set of gritty urban tales, written with all the requisite touches of shadow and fog of the noir masters, is a rare cut for crime aficionados and should pique the interest of anyone who calls the Dark City home."
—Examiner Washington

About this title

About the Author

George Pelecanos is an independent film producer, the recipient of numerous international writing awards, a producer and an Emmy-nominated writer on the HBO series The Wire, and the author of a fifteen novels set in and around Washington, D.C. He is the editor of the best-selling first volume of D.C. Noir.

From The Washington Post

The short stories in D.C. Noir (Akashic; paperback), edited by George Pelecanos, are grouped by subject matter and neighborhood, allowing the reader to take a felonious tour of the city. Interested in the gritty side of Georgetown? Try Robert Andrews's "Solomon's Alley." Not so sure Mt. Pleasant always lives up to its name? You'll find confirmation in (The Washington Post's) Ruben Castaneda's "Coyote Hunt." You can travel vicariously to the mean streets of Petworth and Chevy Chase, Logan Circle and the Hill -- and even to K Street, maybe not the meanest but probably the crookedest area of all, thanks to formidable recent efforts by corrupt lobbyists. The noir-dealing contributors include Pelecanos himself; mystery novelist Laura Lippman, on leave from her home turf in Baltimore; and former Book World contributing editor Jennifer Howard.

Also among them is the veteran James Grady, best known for his novel Six Days of the Condor; his "The Bottom Line" is a tour de force of narrative bravado. A story of double-dealing on Capitol Hill, it crams enough plot to power a full-length novel into a mere 30 pages. From its opening sentence -- "The Capitol building glowed in the night like a white icing cake" -- to the surprises at its finish line, this is a story that never stops barreling along. Grady seems to draw on his own resumé (former Senate aide) when he sums up a certain kind of Hill staffer's career in a single sentence: "Victory at work that day meant he . . . brokered a deal to give air polluters a six percent rollback of fines instead of the seventeen percent proposed by his Senator's opponents."

Richard Currey's "The Names of the Lost" encompasses both local details and international angst. In mid-winter its protagonist, Liebmann, takes a long walk through Shepherd Park, where he owns a liquor store. He crosses Georgia Avenue, follows the fence line of Walter Reed Hospital, returns to the intersection of Georgia and Alaska Avenues and Kalmia Road. All the while he carries with him memories of Auschwitz, along with a tattooed number. Crime happens in this story, but the pace here is measured and ruminative -- a match for the progress of an old man making his way through a tough neighborhood when he ought to know better than to be out and about.

Crime in All Four Quadrants
Copyright 2006, The Washington Post. All Rights Reserved.

About this edition

• Publisher: Akashic Books
• Publication date: 2005
• ISBN 10: 1888451904
• ISBN 13: 9781888451900
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 308
• Editor: Pelecanos George