The Next Best Book Club discussion

Anyone know any good Noir and mystery novels? One day, I realized that I wanted to read more suspenseful types of books. So mystery and noir, any good ones? Based on past experiences, a lot of them are pretty cheesy for me. So small press or mainstream, any of those, just as long it's not cliched and overdone. A noir with literary influences is wonderful too, like Young-Ha Kim's Your Republic Is Calling You

Hey, hello. U could try Roy glen. He writes crime and mystery and noir I'm not sure what that is. But if ur talking about the author Noire, all her books r good.

I just realized I made a typo in the title of the post. Oh the shame! But noir is a genre, here's a definition from Wikipedia:
"Noir fiction (or roman noir) is a literary genre closely related to hardboiled genre with a distinction that the protagonist is not a detective, but instead either a victim, a suspect, or a perpetrator."

Lixian, check out the small press AKASHIC, they run a whole line of noir books... I haven't read any but I hear that they are pretty good!

That's funny I was looking at Akashic press the other day. There's also a record label too. Never knew about that series though.

Literary noir? Possibly the best book I read in the whole of last year:

Pop. 1280

Oh yeah, it's one of those human personality types? Like flawed people? I don't know what I am saying here, but this one seems good.

Flawed is an understatement, but that book should be much better known (and understood) than it is.

Hi Lixian! Taking all of your conditions into account, I think you would really like John le Carré's The Spy Who Came In From the Cold. As the title suggests, it's a spy thriller--so not technically "noir fiction"--but it is as grey and grim and gritty as the genre gets. It's one of my favorite novels. I've read it at least five times and the subtle, insidious way the whole plot unravels still gets me a little sweaty...

I hope you get the chance to check it out!

The dark stuff is good, most of the time.

Not sure if this is exactly what you are looking for, but it's still a great read.
The Black Stiletto: The First Diary--1958 by Raymond Benson

Here's a list of faves:
The Double Bind
The Accident
The Secret of Eden
Envy
We Were Liars
Bubbles Yablonski series
Stephanie Plum series
Cookie Jar murder mysteries
Goldie's Aspen Catering murder mysteries

Perhaps anything by Dennis Lehane (Mystic River, Shutter Island), Raymond Chandler (The Big Sleep) or the classic Double Indemnity by James Cain?