LA Noire videogame inspires short story collection

Joyce Carol Oates among writers contributing to anthology inspired by much-hyped detective game

by: Alison Flood

LA Noire ... 'the finest traditions of crime fiction'

A literary glimpse into the world of much-hyped new videogame LA Noire is being provided by authors including Joyce Carol Oates and Lawrence Block, who are contributing to a new anthology of stories set in the world of the game.


Out next week from Rockstar Games, makers of Grand Theft Auto, LA Noire takes place in 1940s Los Angeles and pits gamers against historically-inspired crimes. An unusual collaboration with Mulholland Books will also see the publication in June of a collection of short stories based on the game's characters and cases, with contributors ranging from the award-winning Oates and Block to the bestselling Francine Prose and Edgar-nominated thriller writer Duane Swierczynski.

"Using the game's world as a springboard, we worked with the genre's best writers to create stories that lived up to the finest traditions of crime fiction," said Rockstar founder Sam Houser. "LA Noire draws on a rich history of not just film, but also great crime literature for inspiration."

Oates's story, Black Dahlia and White Rose, centres on the notorious murder of actress Elizabeth Short in 1947, imagining her living in an apartment with a young Marilyn Monroe. It is not the first time the National Book award-winning author has mixed fact with fiction: her novel Black Water was inspired by the death of Mary Jo Kopechne at Chappaquiddick, while My Sister, My Love took inspiration from the murder of JonBenét Ramsey.

To be published on 6 June as an ebook, LA Noire: The Collected Stories also includes Block's See the Woman, in which a retired LA cop tells a story of domestic abuse, and Swierczynski's Hell of an Affair, which follows LA Noire character William Shelton "into a headlong collision with the wrong side of the law".

"I start feeling it in the middle of the afternoon and it gets worse by night, pictures flashing inside my head, that gnawing feeling in my gut like I'm starving, obsession building like steam under the goddamn LA streets, ready to blow," writes Jonathan Santlofer in his contribution, What's In A Name? Santlofer, who edited and curated the project, told Entertainment Weekly that he decided to get involved because "all I could think of is these millions of gamers being introduced to these stories, written stories, and it struck me as this great synergy between these two different kinds of storytelling".

"I think the idea of expanding their readership to include gamers was really appealing to all the writers," said Santlofer. "My story was inspired by the serial killer in the game. I don't name him, but I drew from the game. I wanted to create a psychological backstory for him. It was also fun to play with the iconography and cultural elements of Los Angeles 1947. Musso and Frank's. Hollywood Boulevard. The winds that come in through the basin. I also play with the real-life gangsters that are in the game, like Mickey Cohen and Johnny Stompanato."

Other authors writing stories for the anthology include Megan Abbott, Joe Lansdale and Andrew Vachss. Publisher Michael Pietsch said the move heralded "a new frontier of book publishing possibilities". "The possibilities for cross-promotions of this nature, encouraging gamers to read and readers to play games are huge," he said.

from: Guardian