Noir Reading Challenge 2014 Are you ready to slip into the darker side of fiction?

Welcome to the first reading challenge sponsored by Gladiator’s Pen.

 Noir: crime fiction featuring hard-boiled cynical characters and bleak sleazy settings

I have had a love of this dark genre for a long time. Noir is the underbelly of fiction, the place where darker themes are explored. I can sit and devour hours watching The Maltese Falcon, The Long Goodbye, Casablanca, Detour, City That Never Sleeps and so many more. (Thank you God for Netflix!) Though, Noir is much more than film.

There are some fantastic books with hardboiled detectives, grifters, sexy molls, tragic cops and femme fatales that will fuel your imagination and make you crave more. So I’m going to challenge you to grab a book and step into the shadows just out of the streetlamp’s reach and join me in reading as many of these fantastic stories as we can in 2014.

How it works:

The Challenge begins January 6, 2014 and runs through December 31, 2014. You can join the challenge at any time between those dates.

1. Sign up with the Inlinkz tool below with a link to your acceptance/announcement post. Stating the challenge and what goal level (listed below) you are going for.

2. There will be a new inlinkz tool posted on the challenge page of Gladiator’s Pen once a week (hopefully up by each Monday) so you can add the url to the post with your progress, book review, or talk about something Noirish. Post at least once a month and link back to the challenge page so we can help each other gain new readers/followers as well.  Even better, if you would like to embed the linky list onto your post there will be a link available so you can pick up the code.

If you don’t have a blog, that’s okay too. Just post to your Facebook, G+ or Twitter with a link back to the challenge page for others to join in and find some great new books and authors too.

Challenge Levels

Read 1-5 books Grifter

Read 5-10 books Cool Cop

Read 11-15 books Hard Boiled Detective.

Read 16-20 books Femme Fatale

Read  20+ books Sam Spade

Here are a few suggestions for some great Noir reads to get you started

The Maltese Falcon by Dashiell Hammett

The Postman Always Rings Twice by James M. Cain

The Black Dahlia (#1 in the L.A. Quartet series) by James Ellroy

Winter’s Bone by Daniel Woodrell

He Died With His Eyes Open by Derek Raymond

Fight Club by Chuck Palahniuk

Joyland by Stephen King

Gold Coast by Elmore Leonard

Storm Front (Dresden Files #1) by Jim Butcher

If you can, try to post your reviews to Amazon or Goodreads also or even give the books you enjoy some stars to support a great author. Thanks for being a part of our first reading challenge here on Gladiator’s Pen and I hope you enjoy your journey into the darker side of the streets. :)

Do you have a favorite Noir film or book?

Click here to get the InLinkz code to embed the list on your blog. 

Grab the button!

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