Chip Jacobs
{{short description|American author and journalist}}
Chip Jacobs is an American author and journalist who has written multiple books of non-fiction, including the social histories Smogtown: The Lung-Burning History of Pollution in Los Angeles (2008) and its follow-up, The People’s Republic of Chemicals (2014). His debut novel, Arroyo (2019), was a Los Angeles Times bestseller.{{Cite web|title=Bestsellers|url=http://projects.latimes.com/bestsellers/lists/2019/12/29/|access-date=2020-02-26|website=latimes.com|language=en}}
Writing
= Non-fiction =
With fellow investigative journalist William J. Kelly, Jacobs wrote the social history Smogtown: The Lung-Burning History of Pollution in Los Angeles (2008), which Booklist praised as “remarkably entertaining and informative,”{{Cite web|last=Pitt|first=David|date=2008-09-01|title=Smogtown: The Lung-Burning History of Pollution in Los Angeles|url=https://www.booklistonline.com/Smogtown-The-Lung-Burning-History-of-Pollution-in-Los-Angeles-Chip-Jacobs/pid=2867354|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200226014855/https://www.booklistonline.com/Smogtown-The-Lung-Burning-History-of-Pollution-in-Los-Angeles-Chip-Jacobs/pid=2867354 |archive-date=2020-02-26 |access-date=2020-08-05|website=Booklist}} As a follow-up, Jacobs and Kelly wrote The People’s Republic of Chemicals (2014), which Kirkus called "hard-hitting" and "[a] scathing denunciation of how America outsourced its industrial capacity to China, a package that included catastrophic pollution."{{Cite web|last=|first=|date=2014-10-01|title=THE PEOPLE'S REPUBLIC OF CHEMICALS|url=https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/william-j-kelly/the-peoples-republic-of-chemicals/|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150216201656/https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/william-j-kelly/the-peoples-republic-of-chemicals/ |archive-date=2015-02-16 |access-date=2020-08-05|website=Kirkus}}
His dark comedy, true crime book, The Ascension of Jerry (2012), was about a murder trial in 1979 Los Angeles.{{Cite web|last=|first=|date=2012-05-17|title=Author Chip Jacobs Details Jerry Schneiderman Murder Triangle In New Book|url=https://losangeles.cbslocal.com/2012/05/17/author-chip-jacobs-details-jerry-schneiderman-murder-triangle-in-new-book/|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120523025827/http://losangeles.cbslocal.com:80/2012/05/17/author-chip-jacobs-details-jerry-schneiderman-murder-triangle-in-new-book/ |archive-date=2012-05-23 |access-date=2020-08-06|website=CBS Los Angeles|language=en-US}} He also wrote the biography Strange As It Seems: The Impossible Life of Gordon Zahler (2016), which Publishers Weekly called “exceptional” storytelling and a “peculiar page turner."{{Cite web|last=|first=|date=|title=Strange As It Seems: The Impossible Life of Gordon Zahler|url=https://www.publishersweekly.com/978-1-942600-24-4|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191219004608/https://www.publishersweekly.com/978-1-942600-24-4 |archive-date=2019-12-19 |access-date=2020-02-26|website=Publishers Weekly}}
= Fiction =
Jacobs's debut novel, Arroyo (2019), is a work of historical fiction set around construction of Pasadena’s mysterious Colorado Street Bridge in 1913. It was a Los Angeles Times and Southern California Independent Booksellers Association bestseller.{{Cite web|last=|first=|date=|title=Bookweb.com regional bestsellers|url=https://www.bookweb.org/sites/default/files/regional_bestseller/191023sc.txt|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200226014902/https://www.bookweb.org/sites/default/files/regional_bestseller/191023sc.txt |archive-date=2020-02-26 |access-date=|website=}}
Booklist magazine called Arroyo a "a riveting and enjoyable look at how local myths are constructed, and a vivid depiction of a time and a place that felt full of possibilities.”{{Cite web|last=Moran|first=Alexander|date=2019-09-20|title=Arroyo|url=https://www.booklistonline.com/Arroyo-Chip-Jacobs/pid=9724198|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200226014903/https://www.booklistonline.com/Arroyo-Chip-Jacobs/pid=9724198 |archive-date=2020-02-26 |access-date=2020-08-05|website=Booklist}} Library Journal said that Jacobs "handles the historical material superbly, skillfully relating the complicated and tragic story of the" Colorado Street Bridge's "construction while convincingly depicting a variety of famous historical figures.”{{Cite web|last=Chip|first=Jacobs|title=Arroyo|url=https://www.libraryjournal.com/?reviewDetail=arroyo|access-date=2020-02-26|website=Library Journal}}
Life
Jacobs is from Pasadena, California.{{Cite web|last=Chapman|first=Justin|date=2019-10-17|title=Local author Chip Jacobs launches 'Arroyo,' a historical novel about Pasadena and the origins of the Colorado Street Bridge, at Vroman's|url=https://pasadenaweekly.com/local-author-chip-jacobs-launches-arroyo-a-historical-novel-about-pasadena-and-the-origins-of-the-colorado-street-bridge-at-vromans/|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191023154140/https://pasadenaweekly.com/local-author-chip-jacobs-launches-arroyo-a-historical-novel-about-pasadena-and-the-origins-of-the-colorado-street-bridge-at-vromans/ |archive-date=2019-10-23 |access-date=2020-08-06|website=Pasadena Weekly|language=en-US}}
Select works
- Smogtown: The Lung-burning History of Pollution in Los Angeles (2008), with William J. Kelly {{ISBN|9781585678600|}}
- Wheeling the Deal: the Outrageous Legend of Gordon Zahler, Hollywood's Flashiest Quadriplegic (2008) {{ISBN|9781933016474|}}
- The Ascension of Jerry: Murder, Hitmen, and the Making of L.A. Muckraker Jerry Schneiderman (2012) {{ISBN|9780983925545|}}
- The People's Republic of Chemicals (2014), with William J. Kelly {{ISBN|9781940207544|}}
- Strange as it Seems (2016) {{ISBN|9781942600329|}}
- Arroyo: A Novel (2019) {{ISBN|9781644280287|}}
References
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Category:Year of birth missing (living people)
Category:21st-century American journalists