Three top novels in the new L.A. crime canon

Jordan Harper is the Edgar-Award winning author of She Rides Shotgun and Love and Other Wounds. Born and educated in Missouri, he now lives in Los Angeles, where he works as a writer and producer for television.

His new novel is Everybody Knows.

At CrimeReads Harper tagged "a multi-media list of works to help bring the LA Crime Canon up to date." One of three novels on the list:

Your House Will Pay by Steph Cha

Cha’s compelling standalone novel explores the fraught relationship between Los Angeles’ Black and Korean communities, a soured relationship that stretches back decades and played a large part in the LA Riots of the 90s. Cha fictionalizes the real-life murder of Latasha Harlins in order to tell the story of two families, one Black and one Korean-American, who must confront the violence of their shared past. Stories about how different races try and fail to co-exist under white supremacy is a vital and complex part of LA history, and Cha plunges into it with open eyes and telling perceptions.

Read about another new classic crime novel on the list.

Your House Will Pay is among Erin E. Adams's seven titles that use mystery to examine race, María Amparo Escandón's eight books about living in Los Angeles, Alyssa Cole's five top crime novels that explore social issues, Sara Sligar's seven California crime novels with a nuanced take on race, class, gender & community, and Karen Dietrich's eight top red herrings in contemporary crime fiction.

--Marshal Zeringue