George Pelecanos

George Pelecanos studied at University of Maryland and Northwood High School. The recorded working language is English. Subjects and genres recorded for the work are detective fiction. Distinctions recorded are Writers Guild of America Award, German Crime Fiction Award, Hammett Prize and Maltese Falcon Award.

• Name — George Pelecanos • Born — 18 February 1957 • Birthplace — Washington, D.C., U.S. • Occupation — * Novelist • journalist • television writer • Genre — Detective fiction • Website — http: www.hachettebookgroup.com/features/georgepelecanos/

Pelecanos was born in Washington, D.C., on February 18, 1957. He is a Greek American.

Inspired by the works of Elmore Leonard, Dashiell Hammett, Raymond Chandler, John D. MacDonald, Ross Macdonald, Mickey Spillane, and John le Carré, he began his career as an author of crime fiction. Pelecanos's early novels were written in the first person voice of Nick Stefanos, a Greek resident of Washington, D.C., and sometime private investigator. After the success of his first four novels, the Stefanos-narrated A Firing Offense, Nick's Trip, and Down by the River Where the Dead Men Go, and the non-series (though some characters do cross over) Shoedog, Pelecanos switched his narrative style considerably and expanded the scope of his fiction with his D.C. Quartet. He has commented that he did not feel he had the ability to be this ambitious earlier in his career. The quartet, often compared to James Ellroy's L.A. Quartet, spanned several decades and communities within the changing population of Washington. Now writing in the third person, Pelecanos relegated Stefanos to a supporting character and introduced his first "salt and pepper" team of crime fighters, Dimitri Karras and Marcus Clay. In The Big Blowdown, set a generation before Karras and Clay would appear (the 1950s), Pelecanos followed the lives of dozens of D.C. residents, tracking the challenges and changes that the second half of the twentieth century presented to Washingtonians. King Suckerman, set in the 1970s and generally regarded as the fans' favorite, introduced the recurring theme of basketball in Pelecanos' fiction. Typically, he employs the sport as a symbol of cooperation amongst the races, suggesting the dynamism of D.C. as reflective of the good will generated by multi-ethnic pick up games. However, he also indulges the reverse of the equation, wherein the basketball court becomes the site of unresolved hostilities. In such cases, violent criminal behavior typically emerges amongst the participants, usually escalating the mystery. The Sweet Forever (1980s) and Shame the Devil (1990s) closed the quartet and Pelecanos retired Stefanos and the other characters that populated the novels. (Stefanos and other characters do reappear in subsequent works). In 2001, he introduced a new team of private detectives, Derek Strange and Terry Quinn, as the protagonists of Right as Rain. They have subsequently starred in the author's more recent works Hell to Pay (which won a Gumshoe Award in 2003) and Soul Circus. While these books have cemented the author's reputation as one of the best current American crime writers and sold consistently, they have not garnered the critical and cult affection his D.C. quartet did. Rather, they seem to be continuing the author's well received formula of witty protagonists chasing unconflicted criminals behind the backdrop of popular culture references and D.C. landmarks. Perhaps sensing this, Pelecanos again switched his focus in his 2004 novel, Hard Revolution, taking one of his new detectives, Derek Strange, back in time to his early days on the D.C. police force. In another interesting move, Pelecanos attached a CD to the book itself, emulating Michael Connelly who included a CD with his 2003 Harry Bosch book Lost Light. In 2005, Pelecanos saw another novel published, Drama City. This book revisited the examination of dogfighting begun in his book Hell To Pay. Pelecanos is a dog owner and has written about his views of dogfighting. In 2006, he published The Night Gardener, which represented a major change of style and which featured a cameo of himself. Pelecanos has also published short fiction in a variety of anthologies and magazines, including Measures of Poison and Usual Suspects. His reviews have been published in The Washington Post Book World, The New York Times Book Review, and elsewhere. The Turnaround was published in August 2008, reflecting a return to his roots, as the novel opens in the 70s in a Greek diner, and a continuation of his more modern style in the portion set in the present. The Turnaround won the 2008's Hammett Prize. In 2011, Pelecanos published The Cut, introducing the character Spero Lucas, a young veteran of the Iraq war. The former Marine works part-time as a private investigator for a D.C. defense attorney as well as taking jobs finding stolen items for a 40% cut of the value of the returned item. In 2013, Pelecanos published The Double, the second Spero Lucas book. Pelecanos has in turn influenced other novelists. They include Kristen Lepionka, who won the Shamus Award for Best First P.I. Novel in 2018. Lepionka cited his "lean, laconic prose." The introduction to a 2018 interview with William Boyle pointed to Pelecanos's influence on Boyle, in particular as a "meticulous chronicler of process."

As of 2006, Pelecanos lives in Silver Spring, Maryland, a suburb of Washington, D.C. with his wife and three children.

• Shoedog (1994). • Drama City (2005). • The Night Gardener (2006). • The Turnaround (2008). • The Way Home (2009). • The Man Who Came Uptown (2018)

• A Firing Offense (1992). • Nick's Trip (1993). • Down by the River Where the Dead Men Go (1995).

• The Big Blowdown (1996). • King Suckerman (1997). • The Sweet Forever (1998). • Shame the Devil (2000).

• Right as Rain (2001). • Hell to Pay (2002). • Soul Circus (2003). • Hard Revolution (2004). • What It Was (2012).

• The Cut (2011). • The Double (2013).

• D.C. Noir (2006). • D.C. Noir 2: The Classics (2008). • Best American Mystery Stories 2008, with Otto Penzler (2008).

*

Production staff • Year — Show — Role — Notes • 2022 — We Own This City — Executive Producer — Season 1 • 2019 — D.C. Noir — Writer, Director, Executive Producer — Anthology Film • 2017 — The Deuce — Executive Producer — Season 1 • 2013 — Treme — Executive Producer — Season 4 • 2012 — Executive Producer — Season 3 • 2011 — Consulting Producer — Season 2 • 2010 — The Pacific — Co-Producer — Mini-series • 2004 — The Wire — Producer — Season 3 • 2003 — Writer — Season 1 Writer • Year — Show — Season — Episode title — Episode — Notes • 2022 — We Own this City — 1 — "Part One" — 1 — co-written with David Simon • "Part Five" — 5 • 2017 — The Deuce — 1 — "Pilot" — 1 — co-written with David Simon • "Show and Prove" — 2 — co-written with Richard Price • "I See Money" — 4 — Teleplay by Lisa Lutz, story by Pelecanos and Lisa Lutz • "My Name Is Ruby" — 8 — co-written with David Simon • 2011 — Treme — 2 — "What is New Orleans?" — 9 — Teleplay by Pelecanos, story by Pelecanos and David Simon • 2010 — 1 — "At the Foot of Canal Street" — 4 — Teleplay by Pelecanos, story by Pelecanos and Eric Overmyer • The Pacific — 1 — Part 3 — 3 — Co-written with Michelle Ashford • 2008 — The Wire — 5 — "Late Editions" — 9 — Teleplay by Pelecanos, story by Pelecanos and David Simon • 2006 — 4 — "That's Got His Own" — 12 — Teleplay by Pelecanos, story by Pelecanos and Ed Burns • 2004 — 3 — "Middle Ground" — 11 — Teleplay by Pelecanos, story by Pelecanos and David Simon • "Slapstick" — 9 — Teleplay by David Simon, story by Pelecanos and David Simon • "Hamsterdam" — 4 — Teleplay by Pelecanos, story by Pelecanos and David Simon • 2003 — 2 — "Bad Dreams" — 11 — Teleplay by Pelecanos, story by Pelecanos and David Simon • "Duck and Cover" — 8 — Teleplay by Pelecanos, story by Pelecanos and David Simon • 2002 — 1 — "Cleaning Up" — 12 — Teleplay by Pelecanos, story by David Simon and Ed Burns

• The Martini Shot (2015). • Owning Up (2024).