Dead Extra

＂Dark, seamy, and complex, Dead Extra is, at first glance, an excellent, faithful foray into old school L.A. noir.... But Sean Carswell is a writer who understands this genre well enough to subvert it left and right, particularly when it comes to the dead woman, whose gutsy misadventures occupy almost half of the book. Come for your hardboiled comforts--the violence, the corruption, and the mood are all there, as are the sharp prose and snappy dialogue. Stay for Carswell’s fresh, intelligent point of view.＂
-- Steph Cha, author of Your House Will Pay and the Juniper Song crime trilogy

After being reported as dead in a German POW camp, Jack Chesley returns to L.A. in 1946 very much alive, only to discover that his wife is dead--and her twin sister insists that it wasn’t an accident like the cops said. They set out to find her killer, a journey that takes them from the boozy back corners of Musso & Frank, to the Camarillo mental hospital, to a seedy motel where blackmailers shoot dirty movies. In the spirit of such noir masters as Cain and Chandler, Dead Extra explores new shadows on the seedy side of midcentury Southern California.

Sean Carswell is the author of several books, including Drinks for the Little Guy, Train Wreck Girl, Madhouse Fog, The Metaphysical Ukulele, and the academic book Occupy Pynchon. He co-founded the independent book publisher Gorsky Press and the music magazine Razorcake. His writing has appeared in such diverse places as the skateboarding magazine Thrasher, prestigious literary journals like The Southeastern Review and The Rattling Wall, and peer-reviewed journals like The Journal of American Culture. A resident of Ventura, he is an associate professor of writing and literature at California State University Channel Islands.