Description

THE DEVIL YOU KNOW is a tradepaperback edition of the limited edition of Poppy’s latest short story collection.

“Abandoning past gothic trappings and using a cleaner, simpler style, Brite emerges as a writer of honesty and wit.”

“Publishers Weekly”

“Brite describes sumptuous meals at swanky restaurants and icy death with equal aplomb, and her stories are spirited and snappy.”

“Booklist”

“Throughout the collection, the writing is tight, the author’s sense of humor soars and the dialogue especially rings true…(H)er best collection yet.”

— Bookgasm

In her third short story collection, Poppy Z. Brite finds fresh ways of exploring territory both familiar and strange. Here you’ll meet the Devil and his giant cat last seen in the pages of Bulgakov, the gourmand coroner of New Orleans, the mad-genius chef who can’t stand to have his cheese list criticized, and an assortment of Crescent City characters who also appear in Brite’s novels Liquorand Prime.

Poppy Z. Brite has found a way of writing about New Orleans that bypasses the clichés and approaches the city’s true heart: the hard-working, hard-partying cooks; the ways in which race, class, and sexual orientation do and don’t matter; the love of bottom feeders, be they crustaceans or politicos; the million little juxtapositions of sacred and profane, bizarre and mundane, sublime and ridiculous that make up the everyday life of New Orleans. Some of these stories are set elsewhere, but Brite always returns home in the end.

The Devil You Know
Table of Contents

Dispatches from Tanganyika: A Foreword

The Devil You Know

O Death, Where is Thy Spatula?

Lantern Marsh

Nothing of Him That Doth Fade

The Ocean

Marisol

Poivre

Pansu

Burn, Baby, Burn

System Freeze

Bayou de la Mere

The Heart of New Orleans

A Season in Heck