Neal Pollack's reading list

This observation at Neal Pollack's blog just caught my eye: "I'm also reading another book in the Hard Case Crime series, the creation of which is one of the great unsung stories of contemporary publishing. Out of one man's mania for the genre, pulp has been reborn, and it's authentic. Genre fiction is where it's at, people. And I don't mean postmodern re-interpretations of genre. I mean genre in its purest form, written for nearly no money by obscure people with day jobs. I feel privileged to have taken a peek inside the noir community, and am humbled and excited by what I've found. A writer like Ken Bruen can hold his own with any Booker Prize nominee. I often wonder what literature would be like if the noir people ran the show....."