Books Like the Movie L.A. Confidential

December 29, 2010 5:38 PM

What books (not by James Ellroy) are like the movie L.A. Confidential?

I love the movie L.A. Confidential (and also film noirs and neo-noirs). Are there books--not by James Ellroy^*--that have a similar style and swagger to the film? Things I like about the movie: the time period, the gangsters, the violence, and the complications of the story.

^*I've read the James Ellroy novel and several other of his books, and I don't like them as much as I like the movie. His novels are too seedy and obsessed with sexual deviance for my taste.

posted by kirkaracha to Media & Arts (12 answers total)

Best answer: Dashiell Hammett's Red Harvest is pretty much the grandfather to all possible answers here, and it's well worth your time.
posted by Monsieur Caution at 5:54 PM on December 29, 2010 [2 favorites]

Queenpin by Megan Abbott. Pretty much everything by Megan Abbott. She is the cat's meow.
posted by Sidhedevil at 6:10 PM on December 29, 2010

Martin Cruz Smith, Philip Kerr, and Joseph Kanon.
posted by Brocktoon at 6:33 PM on December 29, 2010

Ross Macdonald's Lew Archer novels. The Goodbye Look might be one to start with.
posted by azure_swing at 7:02 PM on December 29, 2010

If you like Hammett, you might also like Raymond Chandler.

And it's nonfiction, but John Buntin's LA Noir is worth reading.

For more modern/popular writers, Michael Connelly and Walter Mosley might be worth checking out.
posted by box at 7:12 PM on December 29, 2010

James M. Cain.

HBO will soon be screening an adaptation of Mildred Pierce which is supposed to be more faithful than the Joan Crawford version.
posted by brujita at 10:32 PM on December 29, 2010

A more modern novel in a noir style is Death by Hollywood by Steven Bochco (yes, the guy who gave us Hill Street Blues and NYPD Blue). There's quite a lot of sex in it, but it's a cracking story.
posted by essexjan at 1:48 AM on December 30, 2010

Most definitely anything by George Pelecanos ... and selectively Dennis Lehane and Michael Connelly.
posted by henry scobie at 5:42 AM on December 30, 2010

It's a little further afield, but Attica Locke's Black Water Rising has a lot of the things you mention.
posted by box at 6:02 AM on December 30, 2010

Emphasis on Dashiell Hammett's Red Harvest. There is an early Coen Bros. movie Miller's Crossing with plot very similar to this novel.
posted by bukvich at 7:17 AM on December 30, 2010

Emphasis on Dashiell Hammett's Red Harvest. There is an early Coen Bros. movie Miller's Crossing, with plot very similar to Hammett's excellent novel Glass Key.
posted by bukvich at 7:21 AM on December 30, 2010 [1 favorite]

Response by poster: Thanks for the suggestions. I should've mentioned I like Cain, Chandler, and Hammett (and I love both Red Harvest and Millers Crossing). I'll check out some of the other authors.
posted by kirkaracha at 8:40 AM on December 30, 2010