Ridgefield writer sets sights on 'Wall Street'

by JOE MEYERS jmeyers@ctpost.com

The great writer Raymond Chandler once wrote that the essence of the noir mystery genre was to demonstrate "how any man who tried to be honest looks in the end either sentimental or plain foolish." Chandler believed novels such as his own "The Long Goodbye" were accurate reflections of "this strange corrupt world we live in."

Ridgefield crime writer Peter Spiegelman brings the Chandler point of view up to date in "Wall Street Noir" (Akashic Books), a new short story collection he has edited.

The book brings together some of the best contemporary crime writers - Jim Fusilli and Megan Abbott, among them - who demonstrate that today's global financial services industry is just as valid a setting for noir crime stories as a dark 1940s-era Los Angeles street.

Indeed, the amorality and ruthlessness on display in "Wall Street Noir" is often more chilling than anything Chandler ever dreamed of, because the killers' methods in Spiegelman's collection are so much more sophisticated. And, the motive for murder is money more often than love or sex.

The book demonstrates that "Wall Street" now represents much more than the New York Stock Exchange and all of its supporting business in downtown Manhattan.

Many of the stories are set in New York, but there also are dark tales that take place in Shanghai, Bangkok and Tel Aviv.

In the new international business community, "money never sleeps," so the "Wall Street Noir" hustlers and killers run 24/7 operations with a global reach.

"One of the things I wanted to explore with [the book] is the extent to which 'Wall Street' has transcended the old boundaries," Spiegelman said in a phone interview from his Ridgefield home on Tuesday.

The first story in the book, "At the Top of His Game" by Stephen Rhodes, begins in Manhattan, but takes the reader to Grand Central Terminal and on to Greenwich.

Spiegelman said the term "Wall Street" has definitely grown to encompass "Stamford and Greenwich with the hedge fund crowd."

The huge growth of legalized gambling - alongside the expansion of the stock market into millions of retirement funds and 401ks - has made the criminal possibilities for stealing money much more tempting than they were in Chandler's day.

"Of course, it's all about money," Spiegelman says of the crime in his collection.

"But the greed is a symptom of something else," the writer added of the ways people believe money will be the answer to all of their ills.

Spiegelman worked in the financial services business for 20 years before he turned to fiction with his popular series of John March detective novels (the most recent of which, "Red Cat," was published by Knopf earlier this year).

In his March novels and "Wall Street Noir," Spiegelman allows readers to see the split between "the public face" of Wall Street and the "reality" of what actually happens in financial services offices and on the trading floors.

"The public face is Wall Street as a level playing field - a place of rational behavior, financial models, quarterly reports," the writer notes.

"Of course, that isn't really the case," Spiegelman added of the greed and corruption just under the surface of the carefully nurtured Wall Street image that is sold to potential investors.

The writer said he had a great time putting "Wall Street Noir" together and is happy that Akashic Books has added his new volume to a best-selling series that already includes "Manhattan Noir" and "Los Angeles Noir."