Black Dahlia & White Rose

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Black Dahlia & White Rose is a 2012 collection of eleven short stories by Joyce Carol Oates . It won the Bram Stoker Award for Best Collection in 2013 and was nominated for the Frank O'Connor International Short Story Award .

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Black Dahlia & White Rose

First printed in: LA Noire : The Collected Stories. E-book. Mulholland Books & Rockstar Games, 2011.

The narrative has the extensive subtitle: Unofficial Investigation into the (Unsolved) Kidnapping-Torture-Rape-Murder-Dissection of Elizabeth Short, 22, Caucasian Female, Los Angeles, CA, January 1947: Material assembled by Joyce Carol Oates .

The "black dahlia" of the title is Elizabeth Short , who in 1947 was the victim of a murder that has not yet been clarified and, due to its brutality, has never been forgotten. The "White Rose" is Marilyn Monroe , then still Norma Jean Baker and at the beginning of her career. In the narrative, she is a friend and roommate of Elizabeth Short. The story is first told from the victim's perspective, who reports post mortem about the course and circumstances of their death. This is followed by alternating sections from the perspective of photographer Keinhardt, Bakers, who reports on living together with her roommate Short, and again from Short herself.

In the story, K. Keinhardt takes pictures of Short and Baker. He is the fictional photographer of the "Golden Dreams" calendar photo, the famous photo in which Monroe appears naked as Miss January . The actual photographer of the photo was Tom Kelley .

ID

First printed in: The New Yorker , March 29, 2010; included in the anthology The Best American Short Stories 2011 .

Lisette sits bored and confused in the math class. She is picked up by the police and asked about her mother and relatives. She is asked when she last saw her mother, when she last saw her father. Your mother is away for a few days. Probably with a man. Lisette doesn't want to tell the policemen that. She doesn't understand what they want from her. She is taken to the hospital morgue to identify the possessions of a murder victim. The police apparently believe it is her mother. Her ID was found in a discarded wallet. Lisette doesn't recognize anything. Finally, you show her the body. Lisette doesn't recognize her. Then she gets sick. Then she insists on being taken back to school, where there is a break: “Everything okay?” “Sure, why not?” Whether the corpse is her mother remains open.

Deceit

First printed in: Bradford Morrow (Ed.): Conjunctions: Bi-Annual Volumes of New Writing. Vol. 57 Kin . Bard College, New York 2011, ISBN 978-0-941964-73-9 .

Candace Waxman, mother of 14-year-old Kimi, has had some mental health issues since her divorce. On the other hand , she takes lorazepam , a benzodiazepine . When she went to school psychologist Dr. When Lee W. Weedle is called, she tells her that Kimi has injuries of unknown origin, a laceration on the skull and bruises on the arms and back. This is considered to be questionable and a possible indication of abuse. Kimi said she hit herself, fell, etc. Candace doesn't know anything about it, is beside herself and confronts her daughter. She denies everything. Candace inspects the injury, despite Kimi's fierce resistance. Finally, Kimi confesses that her school friend Scotti is responsible for the injuries. Scotti is Kimi's best and actually only friend, athletic, dominant and intolerant. Candace makes smoothies for both of them, adding medication, psychotropic drugs from an old prescription. They drink together and fall asleep together.

Run kiss daddy

First printed in: Joyce Carol Oates (Ed.): New Jersey Noir. Akashic Books, New York 2011, ISBN 978-1-61775-034-2 .

In his youth, Reno often hiked around Paraquarry Lake in the Kittatinny Mountains of New Jersey . He's attached to the area. He is divorced and was previously married for 16 years (one son and one daughter, both now adults). In his first marriage he had a cabin by the lake, where he spent a lot of time with the family, after the divorce the cabin was sold. He is now married to Marlena and has a new family with their two children Kevin (7) and Devra (4) and a new property on the lake. It is a somewhat shabby Finnhaus , neglected by the previous owners, and Reno is planning various renovations and extensions. While digging for a new terrace, he finds a kind of urn and children's bones in it. Apparently a murdered child was buried here, maybe a girl like little Devra. Reno decides to hide his find forever under the tiles on the new terrace. Not thinking of reporting it to the police. It would destroy his new home by the lake and maybe his new family too. He found a necklace with blue glass beads under the bones. He cleanses them and gives them to little Devra.

Hey dad

First published in: Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine . August 2012.

The father is 62. His son is 21. The father is a well-known figure in the academic world. The son has just finished his studies. By chance, both of them meet for the first time at a university ceremony at which the father is to receive an honorary doctorate and the son is to receive a bachelor's degree . The father knows nothing about his son. At the time he had requested an abortion, his mother, one of his students at the time, had refused. Then he forgot mother and son. The son ponders what he will do when he goes up to the dais, where the certificate will be presented to him, and where his father is sitting in the front row. Whether he will stop for a moment, whether he will speak to his father. He sure won't do anything dramatic. Maybe he'll just say, "Hey Dad, it's me!"

The Good Samaritan

First published in: Harper's Magazine . December 2011.

On a train from Utica , NY to Carthage , NY, Nadia finds a woman's wallet in 1981. It belongs to the ID of Anna-Marie Nivecca, 2117 Pitcairn St., Carthage, NY. Once in Carthage, she decides to hand the wallet over to the address given. There she meets her husband Jalel, who is a little beside himself, a little drunk and perhaps a little dangerous. He calls her a "good Samaritan" and an "angel" and wants to give her money as a reward. She refuses. She offers him help, Jalel lets her "examine" his wife's personal belongings, and finally she makes dinner for him. At some point she goes. In the following years she received calls from the police and learned from the press that the search for the missing Anna-Marie Nivecca was continued. 30 years later, Nadia has not forgotten the incident. She is now a composer, married, with two adopted children. She thinks back to the moment when Jalel said, “It must be something special that made you come to me. One reason that God sent you. ”And this time he hears himself reply:“ Yes. I think you are right. "

A Brutal Murder in a Public Place

First published in: Dave Eggers (Ed.) McSweeney's 37th McSweeney's Quarterly Concern, San Francisco 2011, ISBN 978-1-934781-86-9 .

A small sparrow is trapped behind the windows of the waiting room in the airport terminal and is chirping excitedly. Those waiting notice the chirping. Some smile. The narrator gets up and then sees the bird fluttering around under the covers. Then the narrative perspective changes: The sparrow sees a fat woman standing below and looking up at himself. He is gripped by deadly fear, feels very hungry and his life force is waning. He hopes for help and a return home. Then he sees two men in work suits approaching with a ladder. One has a net, the other a broom.

Roma!

First printed in: Bradford Morrow (Ed.): Conjunctions: Bi-Annual Volumes of New Writing. Vol. 55 Urban Areas . Bard College, New York 2010, ISBN 978-0-941964-71-5 .

Alexis and David, a middle-aged couple, are on a trip to Italy for their 30th wedding anniversary. The last stop is Rome. In the evening they sit on the balcony of their hotel suite, drink red wine and watch Roman life in the lighted windows opposite: a woman who watches television in her negligee , a man gesticulating while eating, a young woman with long black hair who barely clothes the floor sucks.

The following day museums are visited again and ancient ruins are viewed. A change of role had already been indicated in David: a change from serious, career-conscious ambition to a distant, rather older man. But maybe only Alexis' view of her husband will change, until now the one who approved and disapproved and on whose judgment Alexis depended. You visit an exhibition with erotic drawings by Picasso and Alexis feels a regret towards the artist, who, according to her impression, had been abandoned by creativity at an old age, only the sexual impulse remained, which was expressed in repetitive pornographic grotesques. Alexis spontaneously leaves her husband behind and goes shopping in Rome's expensive boutiques. On an impulse, she buys some daring pieces for her standards and is amazed to see the image of an attractive woman in the mirror. When she returns to the hotel, she tries to find the buildings at the back that she previously observed at night. She tries several times, gets lost and finds herself in strange, run-down alleys. Finally she gives up and goes to the hotel café, where she has made an appointment with David. There, an older man jokes with the waitress in whom she recognizes her husband.

Spotted Hyenas: A Romance

First printed in: The Atlantic Online , May 31, 2012.

Just before her husband Pearce comes home, Mariana faces an intruder on the first floor of her house, who disappears when Pearce enters the apartment. Mariana then briefly and vaguely addresses the incident, but is soon no longer sure whether she had imagined it. When she comes home the next evening from shopping, she thinks she sees an animal in the driveway: golden eyes, spotted fur. During the night she again sees an intruder in the house who has pulled a book from the shelf. It 's Darwin's The Origin of Species . The book is from the time of Mariana's graduate study in biology at the University of Pennsylvania , 22 years ago. When she remembers Robb Gelder, the laboratory assistant at the time, a little dazed from a nitrous oxide anesthetic at the dentist, she suddenly thinks he was the intruder. She finds him. Gelder is now head of a research station where the social behavior of spotted hyenas is being investigated and is delighted when Mariana calls him and arranges a visit. He shows her the research station and Mariana is fascinated when she watches the hyenas while they are feeding. How they tear the flesh and devour it completely. When she returns home to her marital routine, she has dream visions of night hunting in pairs. Finally she dreams of how her husband is torn from her and her hyena partner and devoured completely. Or maybe it's not a dream.

San Quentin

First printed in: Playboy , October 2011.

Quogn is an inmate at San Quentin Detention Center, for life. He attends a basic course in biology and is looking for the secret of life and death - how one merges into the other, how it happens. Because it happened to him. This is not the first time that he fails the course, but has plenty of time and can repeat it many times.

Anniversary

First printed in: Boulevard Vol. 28, Numbers 1 & 2 (Fall 2012), OCLC 828861562 .

Viviannes Greary's husband died two years ago. She is a university professor and is now giving an English course in a maximum security prison during her sabbatical year with Cal Healy, an activist and student of social psychology at the State University of New York at Purchase , to fill the "slate gray time" . It would be her 50th wedding anniversary. An irregularity occurs when the hour is prematurely interrupted by a security guard, a pencil sharpener with the blade inside has disappeared and a form has not been filled out. In the confusion, her fellow lecturer leaves her alone, Vivianne leaves the classroom and gets lost. In a dark hallway, her neck is cut open with the sharp blade. Or: After a reprimand and a few annoying formalities, Vivianne and Cal go back.

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Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Bram Stoker Awards 2013 .
  2. ^ Alison Flood: Frank O'Connor short story award pits UK authors against international stars. In: The Guardian , May 31, 2013, accessed January 9, 2018.
  3. ^ LA Noire: The Collected Stories , accessed January 8, 2018.
  4. ↑ A meeting between Monroe and Short at that time is possible, but there is no evidence. See Marilyn Monroe and Elizabeth Short , accessed December 9, 2018.
  5. ↑ Geraldine Brooks (Ed.): The Best American Short Stories 2011 . Mariner Books, 2011, ISBN 978-0-547-24216-3 .
  6. ^ " It has to be something special, why you came to me. Some reason God sent you. And this time I hear myself say — Yes. I think that you must be right. "