Bebop Noir (The Los Angeles Stories) by John Ireland
https://www.amazon.com/Bebop-Noir-Los-Angeles-Stories/dp/B0D25CHCCP
A schoolteacher moonlighting as a serial killer, an obese cop hiding from mirrors in his own shadow, a woman who can’t tell the truth, a man who can’t tell the difference, plus a little jazz a little sex a little Shakespeare a little murder, and an Australian lesbian who sings like Mel Torme.
About the author
I grew up in the movie business…watching them be made…and going to the movies all night long with my grandmother. The movies were my reality…life captured in two-hour stories…a garden of fantasies. My father was an academy award nominated actor. My mother was a more private artist. Along the way, I fell in love with words. Over the years I’ve written and produced movies for television, shot documentaries, acted in and written stage plays, and directed the indie film “Johnny Morran.” When I turned to writing literary fiction, I found myself back in the garden of dreams. My muses are the crime movies of my childhood, with a heavy dose of French and Italian films from the 60s and 70s. Caught in conflicts of conscience, lost in the purple haze and red mist of sex and violence, my characters aren’t sure they’re still alive until they run out of skin.
The Los Angeles Stories is an anthology of six human comedies and dramas, all rooted in the City of Angels. The time is the present. The characters are passengers heading toward uncertain futures. The only technology that is important is the human heart. As I look at these six books, it is fascinating to watch the style and stories and language grow and change.
