Marseille Noir

This entry in Akashic’s noir series navigates the seedy side of Marseille with 14 stories that range from the creepily introspective to the downright brutal. One of the highlights is Marie Neuser’s “I’ll Go Away with the First Man Who Says I Love You,” in which a woman catches her husband cheating and gets the ultimate revenge. Also of note are Rebecca Lighieri’s melancholy “What Can I Say?,” in which a drug dealer contributes to the unraveling of a woman whom he’s loved since childhood, and Philippe Carrese’s wry “The Problem with the Rotary,” in which casual violence collides with the mundaneness of everyday life. In Serge Scotto’s “Green, Slightly Gray,” a pair of young lovers get more than they bargain for in La Plaine, a neighborhood where corruption lies just underneath its bohemian veneer, and darkness lurks in the most unlikely places in Patrick Colomb’s “Silence Is Your Best Friend.” Lesser offerings, however, make this volume a mixed bag. (Dec.)