Synopses & Reviews
Edgar Award--winning author Domenic Stansberry is known for his intensity---his dark thrillers, thick with suspense, in which the differences between good and evil are not so easy to decipher.
The Big Boom is just such a novel: set in San Francisco, at the peak of the high-tech frenzy, just before the technology markets and the California economy all go bust.
The Big Boom features the return of Dante Mancuso, the hero of Stansberrys Chasing the Dragon, an obsessive private investigator working the streets of his San Francisco neighborhood. He is a dark-eyed, complex figure---melancholic, tender, with fierce, aquiline good looks---known to neighborhood familiars by his nickname: the Pelican. Dantes nickname---like the demons that haunt his personal life---comes from his family on account of his tenacity, and his large, Sicilian nose.
Now Dante has settled into a new apartment in North Beach, hoping to put those demons behind him and patch together a life with his longtime lover, Marilyn Visconte, but before long he is approached by an old North Beach family in hopes that he will find their missing daughter---a young woman, a former sweetheart, with whom Dante had been involved years before---and his newfound peace is shattered.
Dantes search for Angela Antonelli, though, has hardly begun when the corpse of a young woman is dredged from the bay. He soldiers on in his investigation, fearful that the missing woman and the corpse are one and the same.
His search for the missing woman---even after he has been called off the case---becomes an obsession that alienates his current lover, but Dante follows the ghostly trail anyway into the heart of the financial district and the underside of the dot-com revolution. It is a quest rendered in the staccato prose of the genre, a style that---in Stansberrys hands---takes on a dreamlike cast, hallucinatory at times, blurring the lines between reality and Dantes own dark nostalgia.
The Big Boom is a tightrope of a novel, a taut story about familial duplicity, personal greed, and the desperate pull of love even across the divide of memory.
Review
Praise for Domenic Stansberry
"A hypnotic, compelling read. It's one part Sopranos, another part Greek tragedy."
---The Boston Globe on The Big Boom
"Stansberry is an extraordinarily evocative writer."
---George Pelecanos, author of The Night Gardener
"Broodingly atmospheric . . . Readers will find themselves absorbed."
---San Francisco Chronicle on The Big Boom
"To all those mystery readers who believe that the classic detective story has played itself out, Stansberry delivers a bracing slap upside the head. And it feels so good."
---Booklist (starred review) on The Big Boom
"Lean, literate, atmospheric stuff . . ."
---Kirkus Reviews on The Big Boom
"Chasing the Dragon is noir in its finest form with near-flawless execution and style."
---Baltimore Sun on Chasing the Dragon
Synopsis
Edgar Award--winning author Domenic Stansberry is known for his intensity---his dark thrillers, thick with suspense, in which the differences between good and evil are not so easy to decipher.
The Big Boom is just such a novel: set in San Francisco, at the peak of the high-tech frenzy, just before the technology markets and the California economy all go bust.
The Big Boom features the return of Dante Mancuso, the hero of Stansberry's Chasing the Dragon, an obsessive private investigator working the streets of his San Francisco neighborhood. He is a dark-eyed, complex figure---melancholic, tender, with fierce, aquiline good looks---known to neighborhood familiars by his nickname: the Pelican. Dante's nickname---like the demons that haunt his personal life---comes from his family on account of his tenacity, and his large, Sicilian nose.
Now Dante has settled into a new apartment in North Beach, hoping to put those demons behind him and patch together a life with his longtime lover, Marilyn Visconte, but before long he is approached by an old North Beach family in hopes that he will find their missing daughter---a young woman, a former sweetheart, with whom Dante had been involved years before---and his newfound peace is shattered.
Dante's search for Angela Antonelli, though, has hardly begun when the corpse of a young woman is dredged from the bay. He soldiers on in his investigation, fearful that the missing woman and the corpse are one and the same.
His search for the missing woman---even after he has been called off the case---becomes an obsession that alienates his current lover, but Dante follows the ghostly trail anyway into the heart of the financial district and the underside of the dot-com revolution. It is a quest rendered in the staccato prose of the genre, a style that---in Stansberry's hands---takes on a dreamlike cast, hallucinatory at times, blurring the lines between reality and Dante's own dark nostalgia.
The Big Boom is a tightrope of a novel, a taut story about familial duplicity, personal greed, and the desperate pull of love even across the divide of memory.
Synopsis
Praise for Domenic Stansberry
"Chasing the Dragon is noir in its finest form with near-flawless execution and style."
---The Sun (Baltimore)
"Stansberry's strong, no-nonsense crime novel, the first in a new series, pulls few punches. . . . This gritty, noirish exercise in murder and drugs feels uncomfortably like the real thing."
---Publishers Weekly (starred review) on Chasing the Dragon
"What could be better news than the start of a new series by Domenic Stansberry?"
---Chicago Tribune on Chasing the Dragon
"Fascinating: beautifully written, fully thought out, and locked in an intelligent argument with itself about what noir has come to mean."
---San Francisco Examiner and Chronicle on Manifesto for the Dead
"The story is a vehicle in which to present a worldview that at one time dominated crime fiction. And it does that job very well indeed."
---Mystery News on Manifesto for the Dead
"Stansberry does it with originality, through the freshness of his imagery and the lyricism of his lament for times that change, neighborhoods that grow old, and people who can never find their way home."
---Marilyn Stasio, The New York Times Book Review, on The Last Days of Il Duce
Synopsis
In Stansberry's second North Beach novel, Dante Mancuso must face down demons of his past as well as new adversaries. The result is an intense read from one of the best writers of hardboiled noir working today.
Synopsis
Praise for Domenic Stansberry
"Stansberry is an extraordinarily evocative writer."
---George Pelecanos, author of The Night Gardener
"Broodingly atmospheric . . . Readers will find themselves absorbed."
---San Francisco Chronicle on The Big Boom
"To all those mystery readers who believe that the classic detective story has played itself out, Stansberry delivers a bracing slap upside the head. And it feels so good."
---Booklist (starred review) on The Big Boom
"Lean, literate, atmospheric stuff . . ."
---Kirkus Reviews on The Big Boom
"Chasing the Dragon is noir in its finest form with near-flawless execution and style."
---Baltimore Sun on Chasing the Dragon
Synopsis
Set in San Francisco before the high-tech markets went bust,
The Big Boom features Dante Mancuso, an obsessive private investigator who works the streets of his hometown where he's known by his nose and his nickname: The Pelican.
Settling in and hoping to settle down, his peace is shattered when an old North Beach family asks him to find their daughter---one of Dante's former sweethearts. Though the case alienates his longtime lover Marilyn Visconte, Dante has no choice but to plunge into the shadows of the dot-com revolution.
A tightrope of a novel and a perfect modern example of classic noir, The Big Boom is a taut story about familial duplicity, personal greed, and the desperate pull of love in many forms.
About the Author
Domenic Stansberry's previous novels include The Confession, an Edgar Award winner; Chasing the Dragon; the Edgar Award and Hammett Prize finalist The Last Days of Il Duce; and Manifesto for the Dead. He lives with his family in the San Francisco Bay Area.