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Blackmail, My Love
- A Murder Mystery
- Narrated by: Eva Kaminsky
- Length: 10 hrs and 4 mins
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Blackmail, My Love
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Publisher's Summary
Josie O'Conner travels to San Francisco in 1951 to locate her gay brother, a private dick investigating a blackmail ring targeting lesbians and gay men. Jimmy's friends claim that just before he disappeared he became a rat, informing the cops on the bar community. Josie adopts Jimmy's trousers and wingtips, battling to clear his name, halt the blackmailers, and exact justice for the many queer corpses. Along the way she rubs shoulders with a sultry chanteuse running a dyke tavern called Pandora's Box, gets intimate with a red-headed madam operating a brothel from the Police Personnel Department, and conspires with the star of Finocchio's, a dive so disreputable it's off limits to servicemen - so every man in uniform pays a visit.
Blackmail, My Love is a murder mystery deeply steeped in San Francisco's queer history. Established academic and first-time novelist Katie Gilmartin's diverse set of characters negotiate the risks of same-sex desire in a tough time for queers. Humor leavens the grave subject matter. Set in such legendary locations as the Black Cat Cafe, the Fillmore, the Beat movement's North Beach, and the sexually complex Tenderloin, Blackmail, My Love is a singular, visually stunning neo-noir experience.
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What listeners say about Blackmail, My Love
Average Customer RatingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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Overall2 out of 5 stars
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Performance4 out of 5 stars
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Story2 out of 5 stars
- Amazon Customer
- 2022-09-29
Just okay
I found this book to be just okay. I thought the plot had a lot of promise, but I didn't really care for the main character, I found her difficult to relate to. This is not because of her sexuality or gender (twinsies!), but because she just really didn't vibe with me. The noir tone really came and went, and felt so forced when it was being hit hard (so many one-liners that just didn't live up to the genre's best). I felt like I didn't really understand her on a deeper level because of this tone and the shifting tone.
I found the plot quite frustrating and bland, and that this book just kept trundling along and introducing new endings, none of which felt particularly earned or important to me. It was tangled but not in a fun noir way, more in a "i had a lot of ideas and I will include them all" way. Did we need a plot about the police AND a specific officer AND a blackmailer, or could this have been a few books? I think that would have made the ending feel like less of a slog.
I also personally had a very hard time stomaching the graphic description of animal abuse and murder. I know that sounds precious and delicate of me to say, since this book is about very dark things, but I found that scene lingered with me and really messed up my day. It was deeply unpleasant, and I don't feel like it was included with enough purpose to justify its existence.
Overall, this was tragically not for me. There were so many elements that should have really worked for me, but alas, it just didn't hit.
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