NoirCon Is Down, But Not Out

According to religious zealot and ”practiced doomsday diviner” David Meade, today—April 23—is supposed to mark the beginning of the end for the planet we call Earth. While that’s unlikely to happen, The Gumshoe Site brings us other bad news, this from the realm of reality: “Lou Boxer, a co-organizer of NoirCon, has announced that NoirCon 2018 is canceled, partly due to the recent passing of its co-founder and co-director Deen Kogan. Those who have already registered will be fully refunded.” You can read Boxer’s full statement here.

NoirCon 2018 had previously been scheduled to take place from November 1 to 4 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Although the conference itself is off, one can only assume that this year’s associated award winners will still receive their prizes:

The David L. Goodis Award: Walter Mosley (author)

The Jay and Deen Kogan Award for Excellence: Max Rudin
(publisher, The Library of America)

The Anne Friedberg Award for Contributions to Noir and Its Preservation: Dana Polan (author and professor)

“Please note that NoirCon as an organization is not over,” Boxer writes. “Deen would not have wanted what she helped build to fall. Once we reorganize, we will return.”

Our fingers are crossed in hopes of this “biennial literary conference devoted to the dark, elusive, and seductive areas of art and life that we have come to call ‘noir’” being revived for 2020.