No Exit Press - Pomona Queen by Kem Nunn

ABOUT THE BOOK

After a few weeks on the job, 40 something Earl Dean has become one of the best salesmen in Pomona. The 'ageing hipster' is putting together the money to claim his inheritance and oust his stepfather from the land first settled by his great-grandfather, an orange grower. But bad luck brings Dean to the house of Dan Brown, 'full-blown white trash', who once killed a cop and is now getting seriously drunk guarding the corpse of his brother Buddy until he learns who killed him.

Word arrives that Buddy was stabbed by a wild woman with blond dreadlocks, leader of a band called Pomona Queen, and Dean, a great believer in secret signs, has a flash: the same name was used for the artwork on his great-grandfather's packing crates.

The novel alternates between the buildup to a climactic confrontation with the alleged killer at a mall concert, and Dean's thoughts as he rides around town, the prisoner of Dan and his henchmen - for Dean, high as a kite but also badly shaken after various escape attempts, keeps seeing "the pale grid of the dead": especially his great-grandfather, shot mysteriously as Pomona's Chinatown was torched, and his one true love, Rayann, dying insane after too many bad trips.

RELATED FEATURES

Pomona References

CRITICAL ACCLAIM

"...Kem Nunn writes directly out of the lineage of James M Cain and Raymond Chandler. If there is a contemporary writer with a deeper sense of evil, I don't know who it would be..." - Jim Harrison,

"...he has a real feel for the kind of dementia that depends on getting the balance of drugs and alcohol just right..." - Chris Petit, The Guardian

"...Hammett, Chandler, James Cain and Ross MacDonald, Kem Nunn has surpassed them all..." - L.A.Times

"...kinda Kinky Friedman meets 'Reservoir Dogs'..." - Colin Ahern, Time Out

"...Nunn is a swift, economical stylist with a gift for the absurd . . . a sure-handed storyteller possessing genuine compassion—as well as a wicked sense of humor... Pomona Queen is a fine, fast read..." - San Francisco Chronicle

"...Large chunks of nostalgic California history, a bizarre cast of low-life characters . . . and a knockout prose style . . . Pomona Queen is a wild and funny ride into the night..." - Playboy

"...God bless Kem Nunn, one of a rare breed, a novelist who knows how to write and isn't afraid to plot and tell a story..." - Elmore Leonard,