Reverse-Gentrification of the Literary World

Akashic Books

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Category: Mondays Are Murder

Mondays Are Murder: Original Noir Fiction to Get Your Week off to a Dark Start

Launched in 2004 with Brooklyn Noir, our award-winning city-based Noir Series now has over 60 volumes in print, with many more to come. Each volume is overseen by an editor with intimate knowledge of the title city; each story is brand new from a local author, and each is set within a distinct neighborhood or location.

While we’ve been thrilled to publish the original works of over 800 authors in the series, we still long for more. And while we are constantly seeking homegrown editors with native knowledge of national and international cities not yet visited by the series, we’re eager to dig deeper.

Mondays Are Murder allows us to offer a glimpse of cities not yet seen, neighborhoods or hidden corners not yet explored in previous volumes, and, we hope, writers not yet exposed to our company. Contributions to the Akashic Noir Series are bound by mood: our authors are challenged to capture the sometimes intangible moods of “noir” and of “place”. The stories run the gamut from darkly-toned literary glimpses to straight-up crime fiction, while similarly capturing the unique aura of the story’s location.

Our web model for the series has one further dimension: A 750-word limit. Sound like murder? It is. But so are Mondays.

“On the House” by Seamus Scanlon

It was a rainy day in Galway. Nothing new—Galway and rain are synonymous, along with fog, mist, hailstones, slippery footpaths, pneumonia . . .

“Tu Mejor Amiga” by Carmen Jaramillo

I felt like God, even though I must’ve been the palest lady on Vía Argentina. I was one lone gringita standing outside a bar full of red lights and Don Omar music, watching people use the tens and twenties tucked in their fingers for cab fare or a bottle of rum to mix with Coca-Cola. I was just a dirt-broke chick who sprinted out of the States like a scalded rat, hoping I’d never see certain people again . . .

“Cranberry’s Last Dance” by Sean Gill

My rusted Pontiac bounced from pothole to pothole and swung into the factory lot. Another overcast day, all dirty snow and no sun. In Northeast Ohio, pessimism is the great common denominator—hoping for sunshine on a winter’s day is as fruitless as wishing upon a star, expecting a quiet lunch break, or rooting for the Browns . . .

“In Paris” by Jennifer Solheim

You flatten your body across the bed. The early afternoon sunlight feathers over you. You grant it permission . . .

“Heliotrope.” by Jake Falls

I used to photograph the ruin. The historic Packard Plant had become my forty-acre inspiration in the heart of Detroit. What was once the grandest and most industrious automotive facility of the early twentieth century had corroded into a sprawling wasteland, and I captured it all through my camera lens . . .