How does a respectable young woman fall into Los Angeles' hard-boiled underworld? Shadow-dodging through the glamorous world of 1950s Hollywood and its seedy flip side, Megan Abbott's debut, Die a Little, is a gem of the darkest hue. This ingenious twist on a classic noir tale tells the story of Lora King, a schoolteacher, and her brother Bill, a junior investigator with the district attorney's office. Lora's comfortable, suburban life is jarringly disrupted when Bill falls in love with a mysterious young woman named Alice Steele, a Hollywood wardrobe assistant with a murky past.Made sisters by marriage but not by choice, the bond between Lora and Alice is marred by envy and mistrust. Spurred on by inconsistencies in Alice's personal history and possibly jealous of Alice's hold on her brother, Lora finds herself lured into the dark alleys and mean streets of seamy Los Angeles. Assuming the role of amateur detective, she uncovers a shadowy world of drugs, prostitution, and ultimately, murder. Lora's fascination with Alice's "sins" increases in direct proportion to the escalation of her own relationship with Mike Standish, a charmingly amoral press agent who appears to know more about his old friend Alice than he reveals. The deeper Lora digs to uncover Alice's secrets, the more her own life begins to resemble Alice's sinister past - and present. Steeped in atmospheric suspense and voyeuristic appeal, Die a Little shines as a dark star among Hollywood lights."Ellen Archer takes Meghan Abbott's stylish exercise in noir and delivers a dynamite performance." -AudioFile Magazine
MEGAN ABBOTT is the Edgar-winning author of the novels Die a Little, The Song Is You, Queenpin and Bury Me Deep, which was nominated for six awards: the Edgar Award, Hammett Prize, the Macavity, Anthony and Barry Awards and the Los Angeles Times Book Prize. Her writing has appeared in Wall Street Noir, Detroit Noir, Best Crime and Mystery Stories of the Year, Phoenix Noir, Storyglossia, the Los Angeles Times Magazine, The Believer, Queens Noir and the LA Noire Anthology.
Her upcoming novel, The End of Everything, comes out in July 2011.
Born in the Detroit area, she graduated from the University of Michigan with a B.A. in English Literature and went on to receive her Ph.D. in English and American literature from New York University. She lives in Queens, New York City.
