Yard by Night: Colin Channer Curates “Kingston Noir”

Words by Jesse Serwer—

Fans of short fiction and smart, urban-themed literature have been raving for years about Akashic Books‘ Noir books, short-story anthologies organized around cities and places like Brooklyn, Bogota and Cape Cod. For its latest edition, the Brooklyn publisher tapped Colin Channer, author of the Jamaican novel Waiting in Vain among other writings, to edit Kingston Noir. Available June 1, the book includes short stories from Jamaican authors including Channer, Marlon James, Kwame Dawes, Patricia Powell, Marcia Douglas and more as well as Kingston-set tales from England’s Ian Thomson and Nigerian-born Chris Abani.

Kingston Noir marks the third time that the series, which began in 2008 with Brooklyn Noir, has ventured into the Caribbean: previous releases include Havana Noir, Trinidad Noir and Haiti Noir, which was edited by Edwidge Dandicat (and made No. 2 in our list of favorite books from 2011). In a nod to Kingston/Jamaica’s musical heritage, the book is divided into sections titled “Hard Road to Travel,” “Is this Love” and “Pressure Drop.” We’re just sinking our teeth into Kingston Noir: Look out for our upcoming interview with Colin Channer on LargeUp soon.