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Title: Noir
Author: Christopher Moore
Narrator: Johnny Heller
Series: Noir Chronicles
Series Number: 1
Genre: Humor, Historical Mystery, Mystery, Science Fiction
Audience: Adult
Format: Audiobook
Content Warning: If there’s an -ism, you can find it in this book but it’s spread around equally. More details below.
My Review:
I have loved and laughed out loud at Christopher Moore’s earlier work but Fool, Sacre Bleu, and Secondhand Souls did not do much for me. I had pretty much decided that I would stop reading his books. Then I was scrolling through my husband’s TBR looking for a book we could both listen to on road trips. And there was Noir looking up at me. I decided to give Moore one last chance.
Oh my goodness. We giggled and howled with laughter as we listened. We were grabbing each other’s arms with a look of, “Did you just hear what I heard?” as we barreled down the highway. This felt like a return to the over-the-top, completely-out-of-left-field humor that I so enjoyed in A Dirty Job, Fluke, The Stupidest Angel, and others. I never knew where this plot was going and now that I’ve finished listening I don’t know how we got to the end, but I loved every minute of the ride.
Now, this book is not even remotely politically correct and Moore opens the book with a brief warning that this is the case because the time period (1940s San Francisco) was not a politically correct time. I rolled with it because there is not a group of people he doesn’t skewer but it will offend some readers.
Johnny Heller’s best hardboiled gumshoe accents bring the book wonderfully to life. But there are two points of view in the book and I wish that there had been two narrators or that Heller had used a very different accent for the second “narrator” because it was almost impossible to distinguish between them.
Needless to say, I highly recommend this for a good laugh if you aren’t too easily offended. We’ll be listening to the second book soon.
Synopsis from GoodReads:
San Francisco. Summer, 1947. A dame walks into a saloon . . .
It’s not every afternoon that an enigmatic, comely blonde named Stilton (like the cheese) walks into the scruffy gin joint where Sammy “Two Toes” Tiffin tends bar. It’s love at first sight, but before Sammy can make his move, an Air Force general named Remy arrives with some urgent business. ’Cause when you need something done, Sammy is the guy to go to; he’s got the connections on the street.
Meanwhile, a suspicious flying object has been spotted up the Pacific coast near Mount Rainier, followed by a mysterious plane crash in a distant patch of desert in New Mexico that goes by the name Roswell. But that’s nothing compared to the real weirdness happening on the streets of the City by the Bay.
Before long, Sammy and the Cheese are making time and having a gas. But when one of Sammy’s schemes goes south and the lady vanishes, Sammy must contend with his own dark secrets as he follows a tortuous trail from Chinatown to Telegraph Hill to a hidden forest enclave in a desperate search to find his girl.
Think Raymond Chandler meets “Men in Black” with more than a dash of the Looney Tunes All Stars. It’s all very, very “Noir.”
Similar Books:
If you liked Noir (The Noir Chronicles #1), you might also like my reviews of
- A Dirty Job (Grim Reaper #1) by Christopher Moore
- Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ’s Childhood Pal by Christopher Moore
- Practical Demonkeeping (Pine Cove #1) by Christopher Moore
Reading Challenge:
Purchase:
Buy Noir (The Noir Chronicles #1) from Malaprop’s Bookstore in beautiful Asheville, NC or
