An Anthology edited by Michael Ruhlman and Miesha Wilson Haeden

CLEVELAND NOIR

An Anthology

Edited by Michael Ruhlman and Miesha Wilson Haeden

As a Baby Boomer, when I think of noir, the classic film noir movies of the 1940s and early 1950s immediately come to mind, films like “Double Indemnity,” “Out of the Past,” “The Maltese Falcon,” “The Postman Always Rings Twice,” “Murder My Sweet,” “Sunset Boulevard,” and the like. Many of them were based upon pulp fiction novels by such authors as Raymond Chandler and James M. Cain.

That being said, in the spirit of noir, Akashic Books has published a series of anthologies, each taking place in a respective city. My review covers their latest anthology, Cleveland Noir, edited by Michael Ruhlman and Miesha Wilson Haeden.

In the world of noir, there are no happy endings. Love stories go south, streets run amok with criminals, drug dealers, dirty cops, deranged denizens of darkness, vindictive characters, and dangerous femmes fatales. Cleveland Noir is no exception. The original short stories contributed by the authors vividly portray the dark underbelly of Cleveland, Ohio.

The anthology is divided into four sections, with stories portraying specific areas of the Cleveland metropolitan area: City Center, The Outliers, The Trendy, and The Heights. From the exclusive enclaves along the lakefront to gentrification to drug-infested, depressed neighborhoods, the authors take us on a trip through the gritty side of life. Add to the mix is the diversity in the characters Cleveland Noir brings to the table.

Of the writers who contributed to Cleveland Noir, three of them are African American. Amy L. Vandiver’s “Sugar Daddy” is a tale of a dirty cop who ruled the streets of East Cleveland until he learns the hard way that karma is a witch-with-a-capital-B. For Angela Crook’s “Bitter,” the phrase “Revenge is a dish best served cold” fits like a winter glove, and like the winter in the Hough neighborhood, our sistah proceeds to do just that. Finally, Miesha Wilson Headen’s “The Book of Numbers” tells of a church bookkeeper in Fairfax who’s been cooking the church books for years. Meticulously covering her tracks, she has an answer for everything while she pockets money for herself and her side business, and nobody has gotten hurt. Or so she thinks…

The vivid visuals each author brought to Cleveland Noir kept me reading. In many ways, the stories remind me of a combination of film noir and episodes of “Alfred Hitchcock Presents.” The famous director is quoted as saying, “Everyone loves a good murder, provided he is not the victim.” All in all, this makes for a fascinating read.

Like its predecessors, Cleveland Noir is available through Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and the Akashic Books website www.akashicbooks.com.

Thank you for another book to check out on a rainy or snowy afternoon, and a hat tip to Angela, Amy, and Miesha. Representation matters!