02226cam a2200313 i 4500 296013580 TxAuBib 20110804120000.0 100427s2010||||||||||||||||||||||||eng|u 2010017204 9780547330778 0547330774 (OCoLC)505420665 DLC eng rda DLC YDX BTCTA YDXCP BIB CGN CPL CDX BWX VP@ LMR EDK UUP TxAuBib rda The best American noir of the century [BOOK] / edited by James Ellroy and Otto Penzler ; with an introduction by James Ellroy. Boston : Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2010. xiv, 731 pages ; 24 cm. txt rdacontent n rdamedia nc rdacarrier Best American series From the Publisher: In his introduction to the The Best American Noir of the Century, James Ellroy writes, "Noir is the most scrutinized offshoot of the hard-boiled school of fiction. It's the long drop off the short pier and the wrong man and the wrong woman in perfect misalliance. It's the nightmare of flawed souls with big dreams and the precise how and why of the all-time sure thing that goes bad." Offering the best examples of literary sure things gone bad, this collection ensures that nowhere else can readers find a darker, more thorough distillation of American noir fiction. James Ellroy and Otto Penzler, series editor of the annual The Best American Mystery Stories, mined one hundred years of writing-1910-2010-to find this treasure trove of thirty-nine stories. From noir's twenties-era infancy come gems like James M. Cain's" "Pastorale," and its post-war heyday boasts giants like Mickey Spillane and Evan Hunter. Packing an undeniable punch, diverse contemporary incarnations include Elmore Leonard, Patricia Highsmith, Joyce Carol Oates, Dennis Lehane, and William Gay, with many page-turners appearing in the last decade. 20110805. Noir fiction, American. Mystery fiction. Ellroy, James, 1948- Penzler, Otto. Best American series.