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    USA Noir: Best of the Akashic Noir Series
    Unavailable
    USA Noir: Best of the Akashic Noir Series
    Unavailable
    USA Noir: Best of the Akashic Noir Series
    Ebook804 pages14 hours

    USA Noir: Best of the Akashic Noir Series

    By Megan Abbott, Lawrence Block, Tim Broderick and

    4/5

    ()

    Currently unavailable

    Currently unavailable

    About this ebook

    "All the heavy hitters...came out for USA Noir...an important anthology of stories shrewdly culled by Johnny Temple."
    --New York Times Book Review (Editors' Choice)

    One of Zoom Street Magazine's Favorite Books of 2014

    Indie Books Roundup #1 Pick, Barnes & Noble Book Blog

    Included in Zoom Street Magazine's Summer Reading (Mysteries/Noir) Roundup

    One of "100 Best Books for Readers Young and Old," HispanicBusiness.com

    "Readers will be hard put to find a better collection of short stories in any genre."
    --Publishers Weekly (starred review)

    "A must read for mystery fans, not just devotees of Akashic's 'Noir' series, this anthology serves as both an introduction for newcomers and a greatest-hits package for regular readers of the series There isn’t a weak story in the collection...Strongly recommended for readers who enjoy mysteries published by Hard Case Crime, as well as for fans of police procedurals."
    --Library Journal (starred review)

    "The 37 stories in this collection represent the best of the U.S.-based anthologies, and the list of contributors include virtually anyone who’s made the best-seller list with a work of crime fiction in the last decade...a must-have anthology."
    --Booklist (starred review)

    "It's hard to imagine how the present anthology could be topped for sheer marquee appeal...Perhaps the single most impressive feature of the collection is its range of voices, from Joyce Carol Oates' faux innocent young family to Megan Abbott's impressionable high school kids to the chorus of peremptory voices S.J. Rozan plants in a haunted thief's head. Eat your heart out, Walt Whitman: These are the folks who hear America singing, and moaning and screaming."
    --Kirkus Reviews

    "A less enlightened Temple cover collection of crime and mystery stories could easily reduce itself to stereotypical cartoons about white detectives with a whiskey bottle and a gun in the drawer but Akashic's series takes itself very seriously in its mission to represent all aspects of a city’s dark side."
    --Kirkus Reviews, Feature Story/Interview with Johnny Temple

    "For those who prefer their crime closer to home, there is USA Noir, a veritable greatest hits of Akashic's long-running, acclaimed noir anthology series, rounding up solid gold blackness of the bleakest and darkest kind...Like Chuck Berry sang, 'Anything you want, we got right here in the USA.'"
    --Mystery Scene Magazine

    Launched with the summer 2004 award-winning bestseller Brooklyn Noir, the groundbreaking Akashic Noir series now includes over sixty volumes and counting. Each book is comprised of all-new stories, each one set in a distinct location within the city of the book.

    Featuring stories by: Dennis Lehane, Don Winslow, Michael Connelly, George Pelecanos, Susan Straight, Jonathan Safran Foer, Laura Lippman, Pete Hamill, Joyce Carol Oates, Lee Child, T. Jefferson Parker, Lawrence Block, Terrance Hayes, Jerome Charyn, Jeffery Deaver, Maggie Estep, Bayo Ojikutu, Tim McLoughlin, Barbara DeMarco-Barrett, Reed Farrel Coleman, Megan Abbott, Elyssa East, James W. Hall, J. Malcolm Garcia, Julie Smith, Joseph Bruchac, Pir Rothenberg, Luis Alberto Urrea, Domenic Stansberry, John O'Brien, S.J. Rozan, Asali Solomon, William Kent Krueger, Tim Broderick, Bharti Kirchner, Karen Karbo, and Lisa Sandlin.

    From the introduction by Johnny Temple:

    "From the start, the heart and soul of Akashic Books has been dark, provocative, well-crafted tales from the disenfranchised. I learned early on that writings from outside the mainstream almost necessarily coincide with a mood and spirit of noir, and are composed by authors whose life circumstances often place them in environs exposed to crime...This volume serves up a top
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherAkashic Books
    Release dateOct 14, 2013
    ISBN9781617751998
    Unavailable
    USA Noir: Best of the Akashic Noir Series
    Author

    Megan Abbott

    Megan Abbott is an award-winning author of noir fiction including Queenpin and Bury Me Deep (nominated for the Edgar Award and the Los Angeles Times Book Prize). Her novel The End of Everything was a Richard and Judy selection and Dare Me was shortlisted for the CWA Steel Dagger. She is also the author of the gripping psychological thrillers, The Fever and You Will Know Me. She is co-writer of the smash-hit Sky Atlantic drama, The Deuce. Born in the Detroit area, she now lives in Queens, New York City.

    Read more from Megan Abbott

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    Reviews for USA Noir

    4/5

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    • 4/5
      I have generally enjoyed all of the Akashic Noir Series that I have read but this is the best of them all. The quality is the consistently high-and why not, with writers like Joyce Carol Oates and Dennis Lehane. Some of the stories are heavier on the atmosphere and others (maybe most) on the plot, occasionally, the story seems more "mystery" than noir but whether it's a man too dumb and too unlucky to pull off the "perfect crime" or a woman searching for a disappeared friend, the stories are engaging and moody (my favorite combination).
    • 4/5
      This is the first of Akashic's noir series that I read, but I have been looking at them for a long time, trying to choose which locale to go for - this one solves part of that issue, since it gathers the best of the American collections into one. And, the editor has done very well indeed - there's quite a wide spread, topic-wise, but most fit into the noir genre in their own distinct way. I've heard of the other collections that they tend to have a few great stories, a few good, and quite a lot of mediocre, but this one is the other way around; most of these stories are extremely evocative and only three of them I didn't care for at all (one of them I couldn't tell you what it was about if you paid me). Now I just have to figure which of the international collections to go for next.
    • 4/5
      I'm not sure what I expected when I requested this book. Actually - I do know...I had the idea that anything with "noir" would be some kind of Sam Spade detective collection. That lend me to question why I was requesting it- I'm not a big detective novel fan. Fortunately, my understanding of noir was a little off. The stories, each with its own dark twists and turns for the most part, didn't deal with detectives. The handful that did were still enjoyable. The talent was pretty much level throughout, making the collection a nice read. I'd recommend this collection and based on the strength of the talent here, even though it's a "best of the best" situation, I'd probably pick up the collections from the different regions - or at least areas I know personally.
    • 4/5
      Akashic books has an extensive series of these "noir" anthologies, each set in a different city or region. As the title suggests, this volume features selected standout stories from the previous books, excluding the ones set in places outside the US.As with any collection of stories, I liked some of these better than others, but on the whole it's an extremely high-quality anthology. (And, at 500+ pages, quite a meaty one, as well.) Some of these pieces are heavy on the plot, but I'd say most of them put more emphasis on character and atmosphere and a sense of place. Pretty much all of them are well-written. And they share a remarkably consistent feel. These are stories about the downtrodden, the damaged, and the corrupt, of people who strive hopelessly for something better or who suffer quietly under their burden of desperation until it bursts forth into violence, people who fall prey to the ugliness around them or give in and become part of it. It's actually given me a new, much more well-defined sense of exactly what that word "noir" means. Because, clearly, this is what it means.Definitely recommended, if this sort of thing sounds at all like something you'd be interested in. I might recommend not reading it through too quickly, though, as it can get pretty darned depressing.Now, I just want to know when they're going to think of my home state and come out with a New Mexico Noir. Come on, guys! Breaking Bad has left a large gap to fill!