Los Angeles Noir (Questions) 1. Who was Harry Chandler, and what was his goal for LA? 2. How did Prohibition threaten Chandler’s control over LA? 3.What were some of the historical effects of the conflict between Parker and Cohen? 4. Why didn’t Cohen want Parker to become police chief? Why did he prefer Brown? 5. How was LA marketed at first to potential settlers? 6. What changed for the LAPD in 1902? 7. How did some cops justify their violent behavior toward those they arrested? 8. What tactics were used by police to provoke confessions? 9. Why did Al Capone take notice of Cohen as soon as he arrived in Chicago? 10. How did Porter end up winning the mayoral election in 1930? 11.What effect did Proposition 14 have on the balance of power in LA politics? 12. How did the 21st Amendment change the Syndicate? 13. How did Cohen’s first bookmaking operation end? Why wasn’t it protected? 14. How did the protections for police put in place by Parker cause problems in the Kynette case? 15. How did Mayor Bowron clean house at the LAPD? 16. What events made it difficult to prosecute Siegel for murder? 17. How did the politics of the New York and Chicago crime families lead to Cohen fleeing to Phoenix? 18. How did the attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941 give Parker another chance to demonstrate his worth? 19. Why wasn’t Las Vegas easy to establish as a travel destination at first? 20. What was the cause of LA’s “gas attack”? 21. How did the industrialization of LA change the relationship between business leaders and the LAPD? 22. What was Parker’s proposition for Stoker? What was his goal? 23. Who did Mayor Bowron find to take over the LAPD amid the scandals of the late 1940s? 24. What changes to the department did Chief Worton make? Were they successful? Why or why not? 25. Who was trying to have Cohen killed, and why? 26. How did Worton want to change the structure of leadership of the LAPD? 27. What was Parker’s plan to keep criminals from evading police by moving around LA county as they drew attention? 28. What was the underworld’s plan for getting rid of Mayor Bowron? 29. What changes did Parker make to the organization of the LAPD? 30. What political issues most worried Parker in 1950? 31. What was the government’s case against Chen? What evidence did they use to convict? 32. How did Cohen’s treatment in federal prison differ from his treatment in city jail? 33. How did Parker end up helping Mayor Bowron lose his job? 34. What were the various factors that protected Parker from losing his job as Chief under Mayor Poulson? 35. What was Cohen’s biggest goal post-prison, and how did he plan on achieving that goal? 36. What finally caused Parker to stop drinking? 37. Why was Graham willing to pay Cohen so much money to go to his Madison Square Garden event? 38.What did Robert Kennedy find out about the FBI’s records on organized crime? 39. How did restrictive housing policies create a strained relationship with LAPD? 40. What caused the “Zoot Suit Riot”? 41. What was Judge Williams’ issue with the LAPD, and how did Parker respond? 42. How did Parker respond to calls for a crackdown on Hispanic youth in 1953? What, if anything, does this have to say about Parker? 43. How did Tom Bradley impress Parker? How did the black community respond to Bradley’s work? 44. Why couldn’t Khrushchev go to Disneyland? How did he react to the news? 45. What were some of Parker’s arguments defending the LAPD against accusations of discrimination? https://www.dghistory.com/los-angeles-discussion-questions.html Los Angeles Noir (About the Author) Denise Hamilton is a Los Angeles-based writer-journalist whose work has appeared in the Los Angeles Times, Wired, Cosmopolitan, Der Spiegel, and New Times. A reporter for the L.A. Times for ten years, she covered not only L.A. stories, but also the collapse of communism in Eastern Europe, the breakup of the Soviet Union, and burgeoning youth movements in Japan. A Fulbright scholar, she taught in the former Yugoslavia during the Bosnian War. She lives in a Los Angeles suburb with her husband and two young children. Her first novel, The Jasmine Trade, received wide acclaim and was a finalist for the Edgar, Anthony, Macavity, and WILLA Awards. Hamilton writes the nationally best-selling Eve Diamond crime novels featuring a reporter who solves murders in contemporary multicultural Los Angeles. In her latest Eve Diamond book, Prisoner of Memory, Hamilton plumbs her own family's Russian heritage to combine Cold War espionage and suspense. The recipient of various grants and fellowships, Hamilton has done consulting for New York University's Institute for War, Peace Reporting and Washington, D.C.- based Search for Common Ground and speaks frequently at universities, libraries and literary festivals. Hamilton lives in a Los Angeles suburb with her husband and two young children. http://www.denisehamilton.com/about/ https://www.fantasticfiction.com/h/denise-hamilton/ Los Angeles Noir (Reviews) Akashic's city-themed noir series (New Orleans Noir, etc.) finally reaches L.A., a prime locale for this subgenre. Of the 17 contributors, bestseller Michael Connelly is most likely to be familiar to a wide audience. Publishers Weekly ...sheds even more light on the dark side of Los Angeles...the book not only offers an array of enticing stories but also serves as an intriguing travelogue of LA's neighborhoods and side cities. Pasadena Weekly Collects 17 new short stories from some of the area's best writers, including Susan Straight, Michael Connelly, Gary Phillips, and Denise Hamilton, the book's editor. Evil was never so delicious. The book crisscrosses the city, with stops in Koreatown, Leimert Park, and Los Feliz. Los Angeles Magazine ... a collection of devilishly dark tales...edited by former journalist and Los Angeles Times reporter Denise Hamilton who has, with present day settings and unlikely locations, moved classic noir into the 21st century. Hamilton cleverly clusters the stories under four headings, and includes a map marking the spot of each crime. Readers will revel in this eclectic collection of murder, desperation and obsession. Mystery Scene Magazine http://www.denisehamilton.com/la-noir-reviews/ Los Angeles Noir (Enhancement) The Los Angeles Noir debuted at #7 on the Southern California Independent Booksellers Association bestseller list for trade paperbacks for the week ended 4/22/07 and remained on either the LA Times Bestseller List and/or the Southern California Independent Booksellers Bestseller List for a total of 14 weeks. Here are other highlights and milestones for LOS ANGELES NOIR: ● Was a BookSense Notable book ● Has gone into a second printing ● Won the "Best Mystery of the Year" award from the Southern California Independent Booksellers Association for 2007 ● Susan Straight's short story, The Golden Gopher, is a finalist for the prestigious Edgar Award 2008 for "Best Short Story" ● Two LA Noir short stories have been selected for inclusion in "Best Mystery Short Stories of 2008," which is overseen by Otto Penzler and edited by George Pelecanos. They are: "Mulholland Dive" by Michael Connelly and "The Hour When The Ship Comes In" by Robert Ferrigno. ● Naomi Hirahara's short story, "Number 19," was reprinted in the Los Angeles Weekly ● Will be published in Italy by Alet Editori in July 2008. Additionally, Michael Connelly's "Mulholland Drive" will be reprinted in an Italian magazine. Los Angeles is the birthplace of noir. Maybe it’s the overwhelming shadow cast by Hollywood, the blur of artifice and reality, the possibility of shucking off the past like last year’s dress and reinventing yourself beyond your wildest dreams. Maybe itis the desperation that descends when the dream goes sour, the duplicity behind the stunning beauty, the rot of the jungle flowers, the rip tides that carry off the unwary. Writers like James Cain, Nathanael West, and Raymond Chandler understood both the hope and the horror that Los Angeles inspired, and harnessed this duality to create their masterpieces. Double Indemnity In Los Angeles Noir, Connelly’s contribution “Mulholland Drive” is a tribute to the classic noir film Double Indemnity, an important (and some say the first) example of a genre of films called film noir. According to Robert Sklar, a former chairperson of the Department of Cinema Studies at New York University Tisch School of the Arts, classic film noir is marked by major thematic elements: a plot about a crime told from the point of view of the criminal; exploration of psychosexual themes; and a visually "dark and claustrophobic framing, with key lighting from sources within the mise-en-scène casting strong shadows that both conceal and project characters' feelings." Fred MacMurray in Double Indemnity (1944) Literary Connections with Film Noir The primary literary influence on film noir was the hardboiled school of American detective and crime fiction, led in its early years by such writers as Dashiell Hammett (whose first novel, Red Harvest, was published in 1929) and James M. Cain (whose The Postman Always Rings Twice appeared five years later), and popularized in pulp magazines such as Black Mask. The classic film noirs The Maltese Falcon (1941) and The Glass Key (1942) were based on novels by Hammett; Cain's novels provided the basis for Double Indemnity (1944), Mildred Pierce (1945), The Postman Always Rings Twice (1946), and Slightly Scarlet (1956; adapted from Love's Lovely Counterfeit).