02/13/2017
The legendarily tough California city of Oakland finally gets an entry in the Akashic noir series. The volume’s 16 original stories touch on “thug life,” as well as such issues as homelessness and suicidal despair in the digital age. Despite a few tales of torrid sexual desire, most of the contents feel less like true noir and more like something barely on the fringes of the genre—the plot of Keenan Norris’s “A Murder of Saviors,” for example, centers on the formation of charter schools. Judy Juanita’s “Cabbie” seems poised to explore controversial depths with mentions of notorious real-life cop killer Lovelle Mixon, a hero to some, but dribbles away into a vague vignette, volcanic potential untapped. Joe Loya’s “Waiting for Gordo” provides visual variety by presenting the narrative as a wire transcript. The editors follow the Akashic formula with a mix of local writers of diverse ethnic backgrounds, but leave out Oakland literary giants such as the street fighter and poet Floyd Salas. The end result is just an average entry in this acclaimed series. (Apr.)
Oakland Noir
Narrated by Various Narrators
Jerry ThompsonUnabridged — 8 hours, 2 minutes
Oakland Noir
Narrated by Various Narrators
Jerry ThompsonUnabridged — 8 hours, 2 minutes
Overview
Brand-new stories by: Nick Petrulakis, Kim Addonizio, Keenan Norris, Keri Miki-Lani Schroeder, Katie Gilmartin, Dorothy Lazard, Harry Louis Williams II, Carolyn Alexander, Phil Canalin, Judy Juanita, Jamie DeWolf, Nayomi Munaweera, Mahmud Rahman, Tom McElravey, Joe Loya, and Eddie Muller.
In the wake of San Francisco Noir, Los Angeles Noir, and Orange County Noir-all popular volumes in the Akashic Noir Series-comes the latest California installment, Oakland Noir. Masterfully curated by Jerry Thompson and Eddie Muller, the “Czar of Noir,” this volume will shock, titillate, provoke, and entertain. The diverse cast of talented contributors will not disappoint.
From the introduction:
Jerry Thompson: “Discovering the wang-dang-doodle jams of the Pointer Sisters shifted my entire focus. Stunning black women were scatting and bebopping all the way into my soul. I think what we've put together in Oakland Noir is a volume where this city is a character in every story. He's a slick brother strutting over a bacon-grease bass line and tambourine duet. She's a white chick with a bucket of hot muffins heading to farmer and flea markets, to sell crafts and get hooked up with some fine kat with dreadlocks and a criminal record. And it's in the faces of young fearless muthafuckers pounding keyboards and snapping fingers, lips, Snapchats, and Facebook timelines. It's the core of not only Black Lives Matter but all lives matter. We are the children of fantasy and of the funk.”
Eddie Muller: “These days, writers and readers aren't denying the darker parts of our existence as much as they used to, especially in crime fiction. Some writers just do it for fun because it's become the fashionable way to get published. You know, `gritty violence' and all that bullshit. The genuine darkness in noir stories comes from two places-the cruelty of the world's innate indifference and the cruelty that people foster within themselves. If you're not seriously dealing with one, the other, or both, then you're not really writing noir.”
Editorial Reviews
"From the Oakland hills to the heart of downtown, each story brings Oakland to life."
"Oakland is a natural for the series, with its shadowy crimes and disgruntled cops."
"Wonderfully, in Akashic’s Oakland Noir, the stereotypes about the city suffer the fate of your average noir character — they die brutally. Kudos to the editors, Jerry Thompson and Eddie Muller, for getting Oakland right. All those outsize statistics don’t reveal a real city, but this collection of local voices — both established and new — brings it thrumming to life . . . Readers who know the city will relish its sense of place, and those who only know the stereotypes will be in for a pleasing eye-opener."
2017-02-02
San Francisco's grittier next-door neighbor gets her day in the sun in 16 new stories in this tightly curated entry in Akashic's Noir series.The hardscrabble streets of Oakland offer crime aplenty. There's booze and drugs, as Katie Gilmartin's "White Horse" and Phil Canalin's "The Three Stooges" demonstrate. There's prostitution, as Carolyn Alexander shows in "Bulletproof." And there's always red-meat murder, the kind Harry Louis Williams II depicts in "The Streets Don't Love Nobody." But Thompson and Muller also take pains to reveal the blue-collar heart of the city. Nick Petrulakis' "The Bridge Tender," Judy Juanita's "Cabbie," Dorothy Lazard's "A Town Made of Hustle," and Tom McElravey's "Black and Borax" all show the fates of working stiffs who can't seem to catch a break. Contributors tip their hats to Oakland's political action pedigree in Kim Addonizio's "The Wishing Well," Mahmud Rahman's "Prophets and Spies," and Keenan Norris' "A Murder of Saviors," which treats the thorny issue of public vs. charter schools. And Nayomi Munaweera in "Survivors of Heartache" and co-editor Muller in "The Handyman" suggest that Oakland may just provide an alternative to the skyrocketing cost of housing across the bay—for the right people, of course, and at a price not calculated in dollars and cents. Thompson and Muller have taken such pains to choose stories highlighting Oakland's diversity and history that the result is a volume rich in local culture as well as crime.
Product Details
| BN ID: | 2940169838688 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Blackstone Audio, Inc. |
| Publication date: | 04/04/2017 |
| Series: | The Akashic Noir Series |
| Edition description: | Unabridged |
Videos
