Dark, cynical crime fiction where morality is ambiguous, the protagonist is flawed, and the system is corrupt from top to bottom.
Noir isn't just a mystery with a dark filter. It's a worldview. In noir, the system is rigged, everyone has an angle, and the protagonist is usually compromised, morally and personally. Unlike traditional mysteries where justice prevails, noir endings are ambiguous at best and devastating at worst. The tone is fatalistic, the prose is sharp, and the shadows are the point.
Noir teaches you to write moral complexity with style. Its prose tradition (lean, rhythmic, loaded with subtext) is one of the most influential in American fiction. Even if you're not writing crime, noir's approach to voice, character compromise, and atmospheric writing will sharpen your craft.
Sam Spade navigating a web of lies where everyone, including Spade himself, has questionable motives.
Philip Marlowe's most personal case, with Chandler's prose at its most lyrical and despairing.
Easy Rawlins navigating postwar LA's racial landscape, expanding noir to include perspectives the genre originally excluded.
Write an opening paragraph in a noir voice. A character walks into a place they shouldn't be, already knowing this will end badly. In five sentences, establish the voice (cynical, rhythmic, loaded), the setting (specific, atmospheric), and the protagonist's flaw. Every sentence should do at least two jobs.