Dion Graham's character range is on display in Pelecanos's first collection of stories. The diversity of characters runs the gamut. And while Graham doesn't nail every accent in the collection, he thoroughly grasps the element that connects all of the characters: struggle. Whether it's conflict on the street over drugs or identity conflict, family strife at home or an internal battle with right and wrong, Graham pulls listeners in, helping them empathize with the characters. Graham also exhibits flexibility adjusting to Pelecanos's storytelling styles, like the screenplay dialogue in the title novella. Graham delivers atmosphere, dark humor, and genuine humanity in a great listening experience. J.F. © AudioFile 2014, Portland, Maine

The novella takes up more than a third of this brisk, hard-boiled book…[the] story couldn't have filled a whole book, but it's perfect at novella length, one of this author's freshest and most original recent works—not to mention his most self-referential. Here is proof on the page that Mr. Pelecanos needed to do something more than keep writing Washington novels.

03/23/2015
For this collection of seven short stories and one novella, reader Graham exhibits a chameleon-like dexterity in performing Pelecanos’s full-bodied characters, men approaching a turning point in their lives. “String Music” has Graham portraying a slang-slinging teenage narrator, a basketballer who experiences the dark side of sports. In two of the stories, Graham employs various degrees of a Greek accent: “Chosen” introduces us to the adoptive parents of Pelecanos’s series hero, Spero Lucas, and “The Dead Their Eyes Implore Us,” set in 1933 and narrated by a Greek immigrant, is a bloody tale of vengeance. Pelecanos leaves the D.C. setting used in much for his work for “When You’re Hungry,” a grim tale about an insurance investigator whose search for a scam artist takes him to Brazil, giving Graham a chance to show off his Portuguese accent. No accent is needed for “The Martini Shot,” but there’s a touch of forced jauntiness as Victor, a television writer on location near New Orleans, narrates a moody tale of passionate romance and his investigation of a crew-member’s murder. A Little, Brown hardcover. (Jan.)

11/03/2014
Edgar-finalist Pelecanos (Drama City) showcases his formidable skills in his first story collection. Among the standouts is the unforgettable “The Confidential Informant,” in which a Washington, D.C., man who lives in the shadow of his aging Vietnam vet father attempts to prove himself to the old man by helping the police “solve a homicide.” Fans of Pelecanos’s Spero Lucas series will welcome the emotionally charged “Chosen,” which fills in the back story of Lucas’s mixed-race family. In “The Dead Their Eyes Implore Us,” a raucous Depression-era story, a Greek immigrant gets mixed up with a corrupt Pinkerton agent. In the title novella, the life of Victor Ohanion—who, like Pelecanos, is a writer and producer for a cable TV crime show—begins to resemble his scripts after a set worker is murdered; Ohanion decides to settle the score. While these eight tales are not as deep as the author’s novels, the collection is still a winner. Agent: Sloan Harris, ICM. (Jan.)

Praise for THE DOUBLE:

"It's astonishing all the good stuff Pelecanos can pack into one unpretentious book that make the story so rich."—Marilyn Stasio, New York Times Book Review

"Pelecanos at his best...The Cut crackles with energy."—Dan DeLuca, Philadelphia Inquirer

"Every time I read one of George Pelecanos's novels, I'm left a little awed...The guy's a national treasure."—Dennis Lehane

"A lean, swift, atmospheric detective novel...The Cut is a resourceful and notably original work the delivers the thrills of an action movie and the poignancy of fine storytelling."—Tom Nolan, Wall Street Journal

Dion Graham's character range is on display in Pelecanos's first collection of stories. The diversity of characters runs the gamut. And while Graham doesn't nail every accent in the collection, he thoroughly grasps the element that connects all of the characters: struggle. Whether it's conflict on the street over drugs or identity conflict, family strife at home or an internal battle with right and wrong, Graham pulls listeners in, helping them empathize with the characters. Graham also exhibits flexibility adjusting to Pelecanos's storytelling styles, like the screenplay dialogue in the title novella. Graham delivers atmosphere, dark humor, and genuine humanity in a great listening experience. J.F. © AudioFile 2014, Portland, Maine

2014-11-05
Seven stories and a novella from the undisputed king of D.C. noir.Pelecanos, who made his mark as a guide to the lower depths of the nation's capital and a writer/producer of the acclaimed TV series The Wire, has been as resourceful and inventive as his heroes, and this collection showcases his versatility. In the first and best of the stories, "The Confidential Informant," a street-wise kid's scheme to claim a $1,000 reward, set forth in scorching, slangy first-person, backfires fatally. "Chosen" chronicles the very mixed fortunes of an adoptive family whose youngest child is Spero Lucas (The Double, 2013, etc.). "String Music" toggles back and forth between Tonio Harris, who's struggling to survive against an enemy he impulsively insulted, and Sgt. Peters, who's struggling just as hard to protect him. "When You're Hungry" shows a kid who escaped an impoverished background to become a crack insurance investigator sent to Brazil, where an alleged murder victim has been sighted, that there's always somebody hungrier than him. A kid who's dealing acquiesces in his childhood friend's murder but still feels bad for the friend's mother in "Miss Mary's Room." The narrator of "Plastic Paddy" recalls the dangers and dead ends he encountered in smoking dope with a faux-Irish friend destined for a "long fall." In "The Dead Their Eyes Implore Us," a young man who works under Pelecanos regular Nick Stefanos avenges a friend who tried to organize his fellow hotel employees, then wonders whether another employee who saw him on the scene will turn him in. The only real disappointment is the title novella, in which a TV writer/producer who sounds a lot like the author tracks down the men who killed his gaffer, an amiable doper, and sets them up for condign justice. The other stories all strike sparks as reminiscences of troubled youth recalled from the perspective of adult experience—or from beyond the grave.