DC Noir (Akashic Noir)
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Book Summary Information
Editor: George PelecanosEdition: Paperback
Published: 2006-02-01
ISBN: 1888451904
Number of pages: 325
Publisher: Akashic Books
Book Reviews of DC Noir (Akashic Noir)
Book Review: The Real D.C.
Summary: 4 Stars
This Washington, D.C. entry in Akashic Books' series of city-specific crime anthologies could have no better editor than the George Pelecanos, author of 13 crime novels set in and around the nation's capital. And for the most part, the stories here mimic Pelecanos' M.O. by ignoring the corridors of power one sees on TV, and taking one into the neighborhoods, history, and lives of D.C.'s true residents. The stories are loosely grouped into four sections.
The first section, "D.C. Uncovered", is probably the best, featuring three excellent stories. Pelecanos leads off with a great portrait of a Park View hustler helping the police as "The Confidential Informant." Kenji Jasper turns the clock back to 1993 in "First", an excellent economical tale of boys trying to be hoodlums back when "D.C." meant "Dodge City". Jim Patton's "Capital of the World" finds a moonlighting cop in one Chinatown's rapidly disappearing seedy nightspots and mixes him up with a Moldovan sex slave, however the story's a little too much of a message about human trafficking to be truly effective. Probably the best story in the whole book is Richard Currey's "The Names of the Lost", about a Holocaust survivor who owns a Georgia liquor store and his confrontation with a young thug in 1968. Like the best of Pelecanos' work, the story paints a vivid picture of the neighborhood and its social history, all while packing a nice melancholy punch.
The second section is "Streets and Alleys", which starts with former Washington Post editor Jennifer Howard's "East of the Sun." Set in a part of Capitol Hill that has been rapidly gentrifying over the last decade (and is home to Howard), it's a rather awkward story about a white family and their interaction with the local drug dealer. Novelist Robert Andrews contributes "Solomon's Alley", an excellent little piece set in Georgetown which encompasses a homeless man, a Nigerian sidewalk vendor, and some nasty Somalis. TV and film actor Robert Wisdom's "The Light and the Dark" visits the Petworth neighborhood in the 1950s, where he grew up amidst other Caribbean immigrants in his parents' rooming house. Baltimore's doyenne of crime writing, Laura Lippman, contributes"A.R.M. and the Woman." This rather ordinary "black widow" tale serves mostly to showcase the wealthy world of the city's upper NW.
Next is the "Cops and Robbers" section, led off by ex-DC cop Quintin Peterson's effective, if somewhat pulpy, procedural exploration of witness intimidation in "Cold As Ice." Lester Irby spent the last of his 30 years in federal prisons writing "God Don't Like Ugly," an extremely pulpy 1970-set story about drug dealers, a woman in their midst, and all the angles. Former Washington Post crime reporter Reuben Castaneda uses the 1991 Mt. Pleasant Riots (between Latino immigrants and the police) as the backdrop for a murder. The 1968 riots hover in the background of Jim Beane's "Jeanette", a fairly typical femme fatale-driven story about a young man trying to meet his woman's expectations.
"The Hill and The Edge" rounds things off, starting with James ("Three Days of the Condor") Grady's "The Bottom Line." While the story does a workmanlike job of getting into Capitol Hill corruption, staffers, and lobbyists, this is an aspect of the city that has been covered to death, and the story doesn't add much one's understanding of the city. David Slater's "Stiffed" follows a cook/bartender as he endures a crappy day at a Thomas Circle dive only to end it in a very satisfying manner. "Noir Soul" writer Norman Kelley contributes "The Messenger of Soulville", a somewhat clunky '60s-set story involving a local record mogul, the Mafia, and the Nation of Islam. The book ends with Jim Fussilli's disappointing excursion into the K St. machine of lobbyists, journalists, and politicians in "The Dupe."
Overall, definitely worth reading if you're interested in an alternative view of the nation's capital.
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