Joe's Word: An Echo Park Novel

By Elizabeth Stromme

In Echo Park, a neighborhood at the wrong end of Sunset Boulevard, Joe, a cool cynic, lives marginally. Ironically, he finds himself becoming more involved than he'd planned in the lives of his clients, linked to their dreams and to their despair, and in some cases to their dirty secrets. His financial reliance on a sleazy character who needs pornographic letters to send mail-order brides soon complicates his relationship with his girlfriend, the beautiful Clio. This noir-style novel vividly brings to life an embattled community of mostly have-nots who attempt to survive city corruption, police harassment, and the daily grind with humor and sheer grit.

"Good things always seem to come in the small, neat editions packaged in the City Lights Noir series. Joe's Word gets my nod for the wry wit of its author, Elizabeth Stromme, and for the amused affection she has for an unglamorous neighborhood at the losing end of Sunset Boulevard."--The New York Times

"It's hard to understand why this delightful novel made its debut in France in 1996 and has only just graced its hometown, but it may be that the French love our L.A. noir almost as much--the French publishers even more--than we do. The Joe of the title is a writer for hire, the modern equivalent of a medieval scribe."--Los Angeles Times

"Stromme packages her moral message in a pitch-perfect rendition of a postwar crime novel, complete with an existentially slow buildup to the main action and a large helping of sexual perversion. This is the novel Jim Thompson would write if he were still kicking."--Booklist

"Intriguing, offbeat noir fiction."--Lev Raphael, Detroit Free Press

Elizabeth Stromme has published two noir novels in Gallimard's Serie Noir in France. She also writes for Le Monde and the L.A. Alternative Press.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0872864251
• ISBN13: 9780872864252
• Release Date: October 2003
• Publisher: City Lights Books
• Length: 258 Pages
• Weight: 0.55 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 5.1" x 7.3"

Customer Reviews

Joe's Word...Deliciously Odd and Murky

What I especially like about this quirky short novel is the tone which is evocative of LA's darkest secrets and most peculiar characters. From start to finish, it is this tone that permeates the writing and draws one in to a very strage world. Can LA really be like this? I suspect so. City Lights' choice to include Stromme's novel in its new "noir series" is indicative of just how unique this work is. Don't expect a compelling plot line and it won't change your life but be prepared for a dreamlike excursion to places you may not want to visit in reality. It's a refreshing take on the noir sensibility with a dreamy overlay of a well understood and slightly disturbing place. I heard Stromme do a reading from the novel at City Lights a couple of months ago and can attest to the probabilty that she may well be as eccentric as her characters!

I liked this book a lot.

Distinctive and very good for those who've only seen LA on TV or film, that its's also a 'familiar' urban life. Liked it especially for not being cranked up into "DRAMA" and for the way in which the letters are this make-believe, and then the varied consequences that the make-believe has; and the way it is NOT predictable the way those consequences do work out.