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A Dark California

Author: Katarzyna Nowak-McNeice

Publisher: McFarland

Published: 2018-02-14

Total Pages: 216

ISBN-13: 1476667837

Focusing on portrayals of California in popular culture, this collection of new essays traces a central theme of darkness through literature (Toby Barlow, Angela Carter, Joan Didion, Thomas Pynchon, and Claire Vaye Watkins), video games (L.A. Noire), music (Death Grips, Lana Del Rey, and the Red Hot Chili Peppers), TV (True Detective and American Horror Story), and film (Starry Eyes, Southland Tales and A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night). Providing insight into the significance of Californian icons, the contributors explore the interplay between positive stereotypes connected to the myth of the Golden State and ambivalent responses to the myth based on social and political power, the consequences of consumerism, transformations of the landscape and the dominance of hyperreality.

California Gothic: The Dark Side of the Dream

Author: Charles L. Crow

Publisher: Anthem Press

Published: 2024-01-16

Total Pages: 82

ISBN-13: 1839983817

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California Gothic explores the California dream and its dark inversion as a nightmare, as illustrated in fiction, poetry, and film. California began as a literary invention, a magic island, in a Spanish romance before conquistadors first visited the land. From early days to the present, the California dream of happiness in a land of new beginnings has been maintained by suppression of disturbing realities: above all, the destruction of native peoples; and by events and facts such as the tragedy of the Donner Party, the persistence of poverty and crime in the golden land, disturbing crimes such as the Black Dahlia; and pandemics and ecological disaster. This book explores a rich Gothic tradition that exposes the repressed past and imagines the fates awaiting a failed California.

California and the Melancholic American Identity in Joan Didion's Novels

Author: Katarzyna Nowak-McNeice

Publisher:

Published: 2018-12-07

Total Pages: 202

ISBN-13: 9780429025631

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California and the Melancholic American Identity in Joan Didion's Novels: Exiled from Eden focuses on the concept of Californian identity in the fiction of Joan Didion. This identity is understood as melancholic, in the sense that the critics following the tradition of both Sigmund Freud and Walter Benjamin use the word. The book traces the progress of the way Californian identity is portrayed in Joan Didion's novels, starting with the first two in which California plays the central role, Run River and Play It As It Lays, through A Book of Common Prayer to Democracy and The Last Thing He Wanted, where California functions only as a distant point of reference, receding to the background of Didion's interests. Curiously enough, Didion presents Californian history as a history of white settlement, disregarding whole chapters of the history of the region in which the Californios and Native Americans, among other groups, played a crucial role: it is this reticence that the monograph sees as the main problem of Didion's fiction and presents it as the silent center of gravity in Didion's oeuvre. The monograph proposes to see the melancholy expressed by Didion's fiction organized into four losses: of Nature, History, Ethics, and Language; around which the main analytical chapters are constructed. What remains unrepresented and silenced comes back to haunt Didion's fiction, and it results in a melancholic portrayal of California and its identity - which is the central theme this monograph addresses.

California Soul

Author: Keith Corbin

Publisher: Random House

Published: 2024-08-06

Total Pages: 321

ISBN-13: 0593243846

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JAMES BEARD AWARD NOMINEE • A sharply crafted and unflinchingly honest memoir about gangs, drugs, cooking, and living life on the line—both on the streets and in the kitchen—from one of the most exciting stars in the food world today “Beautiful. Moving. Inspiring. Get it.”—Chris Storer, Emmy Award–winning creator of The Bear A SALON BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR Chef Keith Corbin has been cooking his entire life. Born on the home turf of the notorious Grape Street Crips in 1980s Watts, Los Angeles, he got his start cooking crack at age thirteen, becoming so skilled that he was flown across the country to cook for drug operations in other cities. After his criminal enterprises caught up with him, though, Corbin spent years in California’s most notorious maximum security prisons—witnessing the resourcefulness of other inmates who made kimchi out of leftover vegetables and tamales from ground-up Fritos. He developed his own culinary palate and ingenuity, creating “spreads” out of the unbearable commissary ingredients and experimenting during his shifts in the prison kitchen. After his release, Corbin got a job managing the kitchen at LocoL, an ambitious fast food restaurant spearheaded by celebrity chefs Roy Choi and Daniel Patterson, designed to bring inexpensive, quality food and good jobs into underserved neighborhoods. But when Corbin was suddenly thrust into the spotlight, he struggled to live up to or accept the simplified “gangbanger redemption” portrayal of him in the media. As he battles private demons while achieving public success, Corbin traces the origins of his vision for “California soul food” and takes readers inside the worlds of gang hierarchy, drug dealing, prison politics, gentrification, and culinary achievement to tell the story of how he became head chef of Alta Adams, one of America’s best restaurants.

Pynchon's California

Author: Scott McClintock

Publisher: University of Iowa Press

Published: 2014-11-01

Total Pages: 250

ISBN-13: 1609382730

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Pynchon’s California is the first book to examine Thomas Pynchon’s use of California as a setting in his novels. Throughout his 50-year career, Pynchon has regularly returned to the Golden State in his fiction. With the publication in 2009 of his third novel set there, the significance of California in Pynchon’s evolving fictional project becomes increasingly worthy of study. Scott McClintock and John Miller have gathered essays from leading and up-and-coming Pynchon scholars who explore this topic from a variety of critical perspectives, reflecting the diversity and eclecticism of Pynchon’s fiction and of the state that has served as his recurring muse from The Crying of Lot 49 (1965) through Inherent Vice (2009). Contributors explore such topics as the relationship of the “California novels” to Pynchon’s more historical and encyclopedic works; the significance of California's beaches, deserts, forests, freeways, and “hieroglyphic” suburban sprawl; the California-inspired noir tradition; and the surprising connections to be uncovered between drug use and realism, melodrama and real estate, private detection and the sacred. The authors bring insights to bear from an array of critical, social, and historical discourses, offering new ways of looking not only at Pynchon’s California novels, but at his entire oeuvre. They explore both how the history, geography, and culture of California have informed Pynchon’s work and how Pynchon’s ever-skeptical critical eye has been turned on the state that has been, in many ways, the flagship for postmodern American culture. CONTRIBUTORS: Hanjo Berressem, Christopher Coffman, Stephen Hock, Margaret Lynd, Scott MacLeod, Scott McClintock, Bill Millard, John Miller, Henry Veggian

Miracle Country

Author: Kendra Atleework

Publisher: Algonquin Books

Published: 2021-06-01

Total Pages: 321

ISBN-13: 1643751417

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WINNER OF THE SIGURD F. OLSON NATURE WRITING AWARD “Blending family memoir and environmental history, Kendra Atleework conveys a fundamental truth: the places in which we live, live on—sometimes painfully—in us. This is a powerful, beautiful, and urgently important book.” —Julie Schumacher, author of Dear Committee Members and The Shakespeare Requirement Kendra Atleework grew up in Swall Meadows, in the Owens Valley of the Eastern Sierra Nevada, where annual rainfall averages five inches and in drought years measures closer to zero. Her parents taught their children to thrive in this beautiful if harsh landscape prone to wildfires, blizzards, and gale-force winds. Above all, the Atleework children were raised on unconditional love and delight in the natural world. But when Kendra’s mother died when Kendra was just sixteen, her once-beloved desert world came to feel empty and hostile, as climate change, drought, and wildfires intensified. The Atleework family fell apart, even as her father tried to keep them together. Kendra escaped to Los Angeles, and then Minneapolis, land of tall trees, full lakes, water everywhere you look. But after years of avoiding her troubled hometown, she felt pulled back. Miracle Country is a moving and unforgettable memoir of flight and return, emptiness and bounty, the realities of a harsh and changing climate, and the true meaning of home. For readers of Cheryl Strayed, Terry Tempest Williams, and Rebecca Solnit, this is a breathtaking debut by a remarkable writer.

Dark City

Author: Jim Heimann

Publisher:

Published: 2017

Total Pages: 0

ISBN-13: 9783836560764

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In den Jahren nach dem Ersten Weltkrieg verwandelt sich Los Angeles langsam von einem Provinznest in eine glitzernde Metropole von magischer Anziehungskraft. Doch mit den Tausenden, die in die Stadt strömen, um ihre Träume zu verwirklichen, kommen auch Gangster und Gauner, falsche Prediger, Sekten und psychopathische Killer. Organisiertes Verbrechen und Korruption halten Einzug. Jenseits der Glamourwelt Hollywoods wird eine Geschichte geschrieben, die keine Helden kennt, aber viele Tote und noch mehr Schurken, vom korrupten Bullen an der Straßenecke über geschmierte Politiker und tote Mobster im Rinnstein bis zum legendären Mordfall "Schwarze Dahlie". Dieses Buch zeichnet anhand von Fotos aus Archiven, Museen, Privatbesitz und der umfangreichen Sammlung des Verfassers die Geschichte eines verborgenen, nächtlichen Los Angeles der 1920er- bis 1950er-Jahre nach, eine Geschichte von Gier, Niedertracht und Irrsinn, die mit Blut und Tränen geschrieben wurde. Eine Reise ins Herz der Nacht durch die Gassen, Hinterhöfe, Spelunken, Spielhöllen und Nachtklubs von LA Noir.

The Black List

Author: Hugh Ewing

Publisher: Palala Press

Published: 2016-05-01

Total Pages: 300

ISBN-13: 9781355019299

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This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work was reproduced from the original artifact, and remains as true to the original work as possible. Therefore, you will see the original copyright references, library stamps (as most of these works have been housed in our most important libraries around the world), and other notations in the work.This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work.As a reproduction of a historical artifact, this work may contain missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.

The True Lives of the Fabulous Killjoys: California

Author: Gerard Way

Publisher: Dark Horse Comics

Published: 2014-05-20

Total Pages: 164

ISBN-13: 1621155439

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Years ago, the Killjoys fought against the tyrannical megacorporation Better Living Industries, costing them their lives, save for one—the mysterious Girl. Today, the followers of the original Killjoys languish in the Desert while BLI systematically strips citizens of their individuality. As the fight for freedom fades, it's left to the Girl to take up the mantle and bring down the fearsome BLI! Collects The True Lives of the Fabulous Killjoys #1–#6 and "Dead Satellites" from Free Comic Book Day 2013. * From Gerard Way, creator of the Eisner Award–winning The Umbrella Academy! * Includes an extensive sketchbook with artwork from Becky Cloonan, Gabriel Bá, Paul Pope, Gerard Way, Fábio Moon, Rafael Grampá, and Brian Ewing.

California Fire and Life

Author: Don Winslow

Publisher: Vintage Crime/Black Lizard

Published: 2007-09-04

Total Pages: 354

ISBN-13: 0307279855

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FROM THE BESTSELLING AUTHOR OF THE CARTEL. When Jack Wade is called in to examine a suspicious arson claim, he follows the evidence into the crime infested inferno of the California underworld. Jack Wade was the rising star of the Orange County Sheriffs Department’s arson unit, but a minor scandal cost him everything, except his encyclopedic knowledge of fire. Now working as an insurance claims investigator, Jack is called in to examine a suspicious claim: within hours of a disastrous blaze tearing through a wing of real estate mogul Nicky Vale’s house— causing the horrific death of his young wife—he filed a 3 million-dollar insurance claim. The tracks of the fire tell Jack that something's wrong, and as he follows the evidence the case grows to involve the Russian mob, Vietnamese gangs, real estate scams, counterfeiting and corporate corruption. Things get so hot and deadly that Jack might not make it out alive . . . that is until he decides to fight fire with fire.