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,”^[2] 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."^[3]

His dark comedy, true crime book, The Ascension of Jerry (2012), was about a murder trial in 1979 Los Angeles.^[4] 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."^[5]

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^[1] and Southern California Independent Booksellers Association bestseller.^[6]

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.”^[7] 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.”^[8]

Writing

Non-fiction

Fiction

Life

Select works

References