Has been said to Silences that kill (Penguin, 2025) which is as if you gave a vitamins chute to the already veteran The confidentialthe work that placed James Ellroy on the world police literary map. But more than an update of Ellroy’s text, which put in black on white the pink society. As if with its pen he threw them to the face which cream cakes, only that in this case stuffed with debris of pronounced moral pestilence.
“I feel honored that they compare me with James Ellroy, whom I consider one of the great American novelists,” explains Harper by email from Los Angeles, where he resides and alternates his work as a series screenwriter with the writing of a police novel. “When I wrote Silences that kill [Everybody knows en su versión original]my ambition was to make a book that dialogue with the great epic of the Noir of Los Angeles, like their The confidentialbut also like Chinatown [la película de John Huston] and the works of Hammett and Chandler, ”he acknowledges.
Harper also comments on the magnet that the Californian city has traditionally had for literary crime, since it is the main scenario, ahead of New York or Chicago, of the golden era of the black novel, in which in addition to the aforementioned Hammett and Chandler, Ross McDonald or Margarened Millar had prominence. “Los Angeles is the world capital of Noir because it is the most American city of all, ”says the author.
“The black novel was created by alienation, moral conflicts and illusions that arise from being forced to serve the undead of capitalism and imperialism,” Harper continues to explain his previous statement. “These gods govern the entire world, so black cinema is found everywhere, but their main temples are in the United States, where Los Angeles embodies the American dream,” he says.
Broken toys of the “Taylor Swift Generation”
The thrilling Silences that killwhich has an excellent translation by Rita da Costa, hooks from the zero minute when speaking in it girls and boys of the “Taylor Swift Generation” on the cusp of success and global influence, which have millions of followers on social networks, in which they live deceiving their fans regarding their daily reality. Many times a hell of drugs, prostitution and mental health problems that lead them to suicide.
Harper comes to say that behind all that glamor that shines in the great Influencers of Instagram and Tiktok, there are many times lives broken by labor and sexual exploitation, with abuses initiated when they are minors in “adult parties”, organized by powerful television producers; A clear reference to cases such as Harvey Weinstein. “Hollywood is a conducive place for exploitation and attracts the type of person who wants to take advantage of the desperate,” says the author of Silences that kill In this regard.
Harper makes it clear in the answer to the questions of Eldiario.es that a generalization should not be done and accusing the entire Hollywood estate of pedophilia, “as ultra -right -wing likes”, but it does believe that current society protects these attitudes. “When a world is built that exalts the brutals, the cruels already inconsiderate, what else can be expected?”
A redemption novel
But Silences that kill It is also a redemption novel, of misguided characters that are aware of their lack of morality, humanity and scruples and that at one point they want to amend. This is the case of the efficient MAE Testt, whose work consists in covering the scandals and crimes of the show stars, as well as the mandamases of the industry, if necessary buying journalists and newspapers of newspapers.
Police gangs should not be seen as an anomaly, they are simply the most acute symptom of a very sick system
Jordan Harper, novelist
Is that character a alter ego Harper? The writer recognizes it: “I didn’t even know when I wrote, but yes, Mae represents my own deep ambivalence about working within the Hollywood system.” Clarifies, anyway, that after his years as a series of series of both weight and The confidential, The mentalist, Gotham and The Shieldnow it is considered redeemed by literature: “What I want is to simply write novels, where I can be more daring and more honest than Hollywood has allowed me to be.”
The other protagonist character, Chris Tamburro, is an plunder expelled from the body for his brutality and corruption, who works as a thug for an organization parallel to that of Mae – in reality both are in the same framework to which Harper calls ‘the beast’ – and that struggles to get away from his bestial instincts. Harper acknowledges that Chris represents a viciated police system full of parapolic gangs operating outside the law. “I wanted to use Chris to show how the entire police culture is poisonous,” he adds.
“In Los Angeles there are two main police forces: the Los Angeles Police Department and the department of the County Sheriff; Both are famous for their corruption and brutality, ”he reveals. It is also declared “Police critic in general, and especially what we have in Los Angeles.” Regarding the terrible bands within the department of the Sheriff described in the novel, he says that “they are documented and are very real.” And he warns: “They should not be seen as an anomaly, they are simply the most acute symptom of a very sick system.”
Hollywood is a conducive place for exploitation and attracts the type of person who wants to take advantage of the desperate
Jordan Harper, novelist
When he is told that the scenes of the savage police gang of the blood brothers remember the film Training Daythat in which Denzel Washington borders the genius when creating the Demoniaco Police Alonzo HarrisHarper acknowledges that this is an excellent film, “but replicates that,” when it comes to the Los Angeles Police, my greatest inspiration comes from The Shield“, To which he describes as his” favorite program of all time “, and of which he was the main screenwriter.
Kyser, the name of ‘the beast’
Mae already joins not only to work in companies of ‘La Beast’, but also an ancient love relationship they had to leave because it was incompatible with the immorality of their work and now resume to their regret. His reunion and the feeling again the fire of passion, will be the engine that will lead them to their attempt to redeem, finally with unequal results.
Mae represents my own and deep ambivalence about working within the Hollywood system
Jordan Harper, novelist
But ‘the beast’ has a name in Silences that kill: His name is Kyser, a clear nod to the dark presence that plans all the time in the famous movie Usual suspects And that does not manifest until the end: Keyer Söze. Kyser is an almighty executive as Elon Musk or Donald Trump is today, a man above good and evil. “I thought about that movie for what it represents and I must say that Kyser is a mysterious figure in this book, but he will return, I will explore it more in my next novels,” says Harper.
To close, it is imposed to ask this excellent police novelist if the collusion of Milmillonarios, Politicians and Parapolial Institutions with frames such as ‘The Beast’ draws a conception of the world in which democracy is no more than an entelechy to make citizens believe that concepts such as “equality”, “justice” or “equity” remain valid. “I feel tempted to respond simply with the word ‘yes,” he replies.
And Finally Harper: “Look at the headlines; Look at the world; There are good people in him, but is the world helping her? There leaves the author of Silences that killa novel whose reading is like taking a peeled cable with both hands and pressing hard until it smells like cheaming meat.
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