We bring exceptional, critically acclaimed books back into the spotlight.
WHAT WE PUBLISHBased in downtown Los Angeles, Darkspur Press revives out-of-print books by authors who’ve lived what they write about.
These are works of substance—critically acclaimed, grounded in experience, and shaped by real events. Stories that were nearly lost, now brought back with purpose.
We also publish select original titles—fiction and nonfiction—with the same standard: lived truth, sharp craft, and lasting impact.
Now bringing back
three highly acclaimed novels…
Laughing War
A NOVEL
Originally published by Doubleday
Barney is a young comedian who must stand up in front of battle hardened troops in the most chaotic and dangerous days of the Vietnam war and find some way to make them laugh. His perilous existence is made more dangerous when he falls in love with the beautiful young singer who is also entertaining the troop —and is secretly the Colonel’s mistress.
Barney learned the catchword “Todiachen”—Die Laughing from his burlesque-trooper grandfather. And now in Vietnam, working as a comedian in officers’ clubs, Barney has to use laughter as a weapon against the insanity around him . . . with practiced storytelling skill, Burke renders it movingly here in what could be the “Catch-22” of Southeast Asia. - PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Leny Bruce once said that humor is tragedy plus time, but time runs out oin Barney. In one of the best fictional Vietnam scenes yet published, he faces the convergence of his jokes and the real world. - THE WASHINGTON POST
. . . a wonder of intense, cinematic storytelling. It is also a novel that works well on many different levels, as comedy, romance, period piece, thriller, switching fluidly from one to another…Considering the treacherous characters and grimly comic incidents, the reader may be surprised but not shocked by the ending. It is an ending that demonstrates Martyn Burke’s subtle understanding of human nature in some of its more cruel, enigmatic manifestations. He has written a novel that is honest, inventive, memorable.- WALL STREET JOURNAL
The Commissar’s Report
A NOVEL
Originally published by Houghton Mifflin
Dimitri was the brightest, young KGB spy that Moscow had sent to New York. His job there was to secretly devise ways to overthrow the capitalists. To his horror (and delight), he finds his flamboyantly willful wife Katya has won money in a contest. American money! Through a fluke, he is becoming a rich capitalist. His new fortune could also be his downfall, as his KGB bosses could shoot him on sight if his secret were ever discovered. As Katya lusts after all the furs and jewels her money could provide, Dimitri desperately works to maintain his mission, hide their wealth, and avoid the KGB's suspicion in the historical romance "The Commissar's Report."
COMING SOON ⇢
Martyn Burke’s “Ivory Joe” is the kind of book that reminds you –in case you need reminding—that reading can be tremendous fun. Burke has created a vast, unruly, quintessentially American landscape here, and getting lost in it is an anything but simple pleasure. Prepare to get carried away . . Martyn Burke is a storyteller of lavish generosity.
- THE WASHINGTON POST
Ivory Joe
A NOVEL
Originally published by Bantam
Set in 1950's New York during the dawn of rock n' roll, Ivory Joe is a love story that begins with a divorce. On the outside, Leo and Tina had no business being together but their two daughters kept their lives forever entangled. When the unlikely pair find themselves wrapped up with Ivory Joe, an amazing singer with a fiery personality, their life suddenly changed forever. With a controlling mob lurking in every corner, Leo and Tina are about to pay a price they aren't sure is worth it.
COMING SOON ⇢