Paris Noir

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Good to finally hear from you but don’t forget to send me an introduction.

This e-mail from Akashic Books publisher Johnny Temple has been blinking on my computer screen for the last two days. But when I chose to work in book publishing, it was precisely to avoid having to write anything; I want to stay in the background, the way a bass player stands in the dark and smiles as he watches the guitarist launch into a wild solo.

I kept going around and around without a clue, like a mouse on its wheel, until I finally decided to visit Momo, the old guy who sells used books in my neighborhood. If Paris is still and always will be a “noir” city, it’s in part because of Momo and his toiling colleagues, the dozens of small, independent bookstore owners who sell old pulp fiction from the ’50s through the ’70s. Amateurs meet every weekend and swap their own finds for new treasures. Momo’s the one who trained me as a kid by handing me Goodis, Thompson, Chandler. So you can just see him going soft all over at the idea of the Série Noire making it to the American scene. We, the French, are good at importing things... but exporting is another story.

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