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A Novel
by Robert Coover
With impeccable skill, Robert Coover, one of America's pioneering postmodernists, has turned the classic detective story inside-out. Here Coover is at the top of his form; and Noir is a true page-turner - wry, absurd, and desolate.
You are Philip M. Noir, Private Investigator. A mysterious young widow hires you to find her husband's killer - if he was killed. Then your client is killed and her body disappears - if she was your client. Your search for clues takes you through all levels of the city, from classy lounges to lowlife dives, from jazz bars to a rich sex kitten's bedroom, from yachts to the morgue. "The Case of the Vanishing Black Widow" unfolds over five days above ground and three or four in smugglers' tunnels, though flashback and anecdote, and expands time into something much larger. You don't always get the joke, though most people think what's happening is pretty funny.
"Metafiction lustily mates with hard-boiled mystery in this hilarious homage to Raymond Chandler and company." - Publishers Weekly
"Coover's hyperbolic style isn't everyone's cup of tea, but this is a funny book." - Library Journal
"While Coover's unnamed city is a cesspool of crime and corruption governed by nightmare logic, the absurd tone lets us know it's all in fun. Depraved and amusing. " - Kirkus Reviews
This information about Noir was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Robert Coover teaches at Brown University. He is the author of many novels, short story collections, and plays. He lives in London and in Providence, Rhode Island.
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