Laura Lippman: Baltimore Noir

SUJATA MASSEYgraduated from Johns Hopkins University and worked as a reporter at the late but great Baltimore Evening Sun before turning to a life of crime fiction. She is the author of nine novels, most recently The Typhoon Lover She enjoys living in Roland Park, though she has pledged never to take up gardening or drive a Humvee.

BEN NEIHARTlived in the “landmark” Marylander apartment building in the Charles Village neighborhood of Baltimore for three years during the mid-1990s. He is the author of the books Hey Joe, Burning Girl, and Rough Amusements and his work has appeared in the New York Times Magazine, the New Yorker, Travel & Leisure, and the Baltimore Sun . He currently lives in New York.

DAVID SIMONis a former crime reporter with the Baltimore Sun and the author of Homicide and The Corner, two works of narrative nonfiction. He is also a writer and executive producer of HBO’s The Wire .

CHARLIE STELLAplayed Strat-O-Matic baseball as a kid, until his father put him on a twelve-step program to rein in his addiction. In Stella’s world (Strat-O-Matic), the Orioles beat his Mets in seven back in ’69 (when he was thirteen).

MARCIA TALLEYis the Agatha and Anthony Award winning author of six novels featuring amateur sleuth Hannah Ives, set in Annapolis, Baltimore, and other locales around Maryland’s scenic Chesapeake Bay. She is author/editor of two star-studded collaborative serial novels, Naked Came the Phoenix and I’d Kill For That , and her short stories have appeared in more than a dozen collections.

JOSEPH WALLACEhas written more than fifteen books and dozens of articles on topics as diverse as baseball, natural history, medicine, and the invention of the light bulb. “Liminal” is his first piece of published noir. He’s grateful to Laura Lippman for requesting it, especially since he’s a lifelong New York Mets fan with vivid memories of the 1969 World Series.

ROBERT WARDwas born and raised in Baltimore and now lives in Los Angeles, where he writes fiction, screenplays, and television dramas. He is the author of six novels, including Red Baker winner of the Pen West Award for Best Novel. “Fat Chance” is about the pull of Charm City, with its neighborhoods and personal history, versus “success” in Los Angeles.

SARAH WEINMANis the crime-fiction columnist for the Baltimore Sun and the proprietor of the literary blog “Confessions of an Idiosyncratic Mind” (at www.sarahweinman.com). Her stories have appeared in several print and online publications, including Dublin Noir . She lives in Manhattan, only a Metroliner away from Baltimore.