The cover art of “The Long Cold” was created by De Noux’s daughter who graduated from Southeastern with an art degree. 
Courtesy of O’Neil De Noux

Southeastern’s very own police detective, O’Neil De Noux, has released his 31st novel. De Noux released his first book in 1988. His new book, “The Long Cold,” is the latest addition to his LaStanza New Orleans Police series. De Noux has always wanted to be a writer and one could say publishing 31 books is a huge accomplishment for him. 

“When I was in high school, I wanted to be a writer, and I thought one day I would grow up and write a book,” said Denoux. “I didn’t realize I would write a lot.” 

De Noux has won multiple awards for his work such as: the Private Eye Writers of America’s Shamus Award, the Short Mystery Fiction Society’s Derringer Award and the 2011 Best Police Book of the Year by police-writers.com. He did not know what he wanted to write about, at first, until he gained experience being a detective.

“It wasn’t until I became a homicide detective that I knew what I wanted to write about because I knew what I was seeing and what I experienced was different and pretty unique from what other writers are doing, so I wrote this series and the first one is called the ‘Grim Reaper’ and it came out in 88’,” said De Noux.

“The Long Cold” is a novel about the New Orleans Mafia, and the story of how a homicide detective attempts to solve the case.

“This book is different than most of the books I have written,” said De Noux. “It’s really a quieter book because it’s an old case, a long cold case. The murder occurred 30 years ago, and the detective is getting it later, and he didn’t want anything to do with it until he discovers there is a connection between the victim and his family, so it’s personal. And of course his wife doesn’t want him to do it, his friends don’t want him to do it. Nobody wants him to go against the mafia, but he does it anyway because he’s a hard headed Sicilian former cop and he just does it.”

The Mafia in the book is based off of the actual Sicilian Mafia, and De Noux had to do a little research about these criminals to provide realistic information in his novel.

“I researched mostly about the mafia; in the book, the main character butts heads with the mafia,” said De Noux. “I used to be an organized crime investigator, so I knew some of the background [information on the mafia].”

This book is a stand-alone, the reader does not have to read the previous novels to understand the story. There will be another book after this one in the series; De Noux has recently finished writing the first draft.

“What I would like them to know [readers] is that it’s a really quiet, intricate, cerebral novel about New Orleans and Italian-Americans,” said De Noux. “Primarily, my books are set in New Orleans; I was born and raised there.”

For more information on this book and other novels by De Noux visit his website www.oneildenoux.net.