Disposable Diaries: Sara Gran
Our latest ‘Disposable Diaries’ comes from Sara Gran, author of the novels Dope, Come Closer, Saturn’s Return to New York and three novels about Claire DeWitt, a talented but troubled private detective. The third and most recent instalment in the series, The Infinite Blacktop, is set partly in Los Angeles, and through a series of photographs taken in LA, Gran introduces us to Claire DeWitt’s life.
‘This world is a broken place, where everything we love will fade into dust. We owe it to ourselves and each other to find beauty, and show it to others where we find it, and where none exists, to create it.’
Kill all the wise men. Burn all the books. The kingdom of truth is your birthright, and the only thing standing in between you and the kingdom is your own monstrous, idiotic, self.
I was drifting around the country, working for other PIs and solving my own cases as they came to me. I didn’t want a steady job and I didn’t want a steady life and I didn’t want to love anyone.
Back then every city had a detectives’ bar, where PIs would meet and trade hope and bullshit and company when they passed through town.
Merritt was a life-long inhabitant of Los Angeles and his whole world was here in the city.
There was an energy to Los Angeles that was sharp and would cut you if you didn’t recognize it. Every grain of sand in the beaches and desert buried under the city was a little razor, ready and willing to wound. But if you saw it for what it was, I was learning, you could manoeuvre in between the knives and glide through the city, like a needle in a record. You just had to keep your eyes open for synchronicity, and never expect kindness. Just shut up and be grateful when it appeared.
Let this make you beautiful. Just a little bit. Just one little inch of you. The rest of you can stay ugly and mean and bitter. Someone loved you. She was your friend. You miss her. Let her make one little piece of your heart beautiful.
Dear Mr Dubinsky,
Hope you are enjoying Slovakia and your family is well.
The Richter headquarters were in a big glass tower nestled snugly on the border of Beverly Hills and Century City and whatever came next, within spitting distance of a dozen other big glass towers that radiated black arts and dark power—banks, talent agencies, law firms. No one had picked this location by accident, the meeting point of key lines that stretched back to China and dragon lines that flowed around from London and Paris.
‘God tells us so little, and asks so much.’
The path is often lonely and frightening, but many are on your side. Welcome, and know that even in the darkest hour, you are never forgot.
The Infinite Blacktop is available in hardback here.
