Blood Money « Friends/Family/Fans of Max Allan Collins

You Like Me, You Really Like Me!…Right?

Tuesday, June 8th, 2021

In the writing game, you never know when – or even if – honors will come your way. I’ve been lucky, and I mark the first big non-Dick Tracy career breakthrough for me as winning the Best Novel “Shamus” from the Private Eye Writers of America for True Detective in 1984. That put me, and Nate Heller, on the map.

A second Heller win (Stolen Away), and numerous Heller nominations over the years, culminated with the PWA honoring the series itself with the Hammer Award for its contribution to the genre. Then, for the last several Heller novels, it’s been quiet…too quiet.

Now, I am thrilled to say, the most current Nathan Heller novel, Do No Harm, has been nominated for the Best Novel “Shamus” by the PWA.

I spent several decades of my writing life supplementing my Heller and other novels with tie-in writing, doing novelizations of movies and original novels of popular TV series, the latter often with Matthew V. Clemens (we’re doing our John Sand series together at Wolfpack currently). One of the frustrations about writing media tie-in novels had always been the lack of respect and attention they got, quite apart from their quality (or for that matter lack of it).

My fellow tie-in writer Lee Goldberg – an actual TV screenwriter in addition to author of novels tied-in with shows where he’d contributed scripts, Monk and Diagnosis: Murder among them – had been thinking about starting an organization like the MWA and PWA for tie-in writers. I was having the same thought at the same time, and both of us had a particular goal of having annual awards, including a grand master award.

We threw in together and founded the International Association of Media and Tie-in Writers in 2006, and created the Scribe Awards for various categories, with the Faust as a grand master award. Faust refers not only to the Faustian bargain tie-in writers agree to with the owners of the properties, but also to Frederick Faust, aka Max Brand, a prolific writer whose creations included Destry (of Destry Rides Again fame) and Dr. Kildare (for which he wrote his own novelizations).

Lee and I stepped down from leadership a few years ago, but the organization – now led by multiple Bram Stoker Award-winning suspense author Jonathan Maberry – is still going strong.

On the heels of the Shamus nomination, I received a second, rather overwhelming honor from the IAMTW, and have been chosen this year’s Faust winner – my third lifetime achievement award (preceded by the Eye from the PWA and the Grand Master Edgar from MWA), which is either an incredible honor bestowed upon me by my peers, or an indication that they think I’ve lived long enough.

Maybe both.

At any rate, I am shocked and pleased by this honor. The previous Faust winners include some of the best writers in the business (not just the tie-in business). I was further honored by a Best Novel “Scribe” nomination for the newest Mike Hammer, Masquerade for Murder.

All of these honors are wonderful, but the greatest honor of all is being married to Barbara Collins for 53 years. We’ve been together 55 – starting to go together at Muscatine Community College in 1966 – and getting married on June 1, 1968.

For our most ambitious post-lockdown day trip, Barb and I went to a favorite spot of ours, Galena, Illinois, to celebrate our anniversary. The accompanying picture is of us at Vinny Vanucchi’s, our favorite Galena restaurant. We shopped and just enjoyed a lovely day, but also stopped by the police department to see Chief Lori Huntington.

Lori is retiring after nine years in that position, and almost thirty years in Galena law enforcement. She was my consultant on both The Girl Most Likely and The Girl Can’t Help It. I could lie and say she was the inspiration for Chief Krista Larson in those novels, but I had conceived of that character before discovering that Galena indeed had a female chief of police.

But knowing Lori, and talking to her at length over the writing of the two novels, meant she had a huge impact on how the character was shaped, as well as keeping me honest about law enforcement in her little town – a tourist center that can see a million visitors, easily, in a year. She has generously agreed to let me stay in touch should I get around to writing a third Krista and Keith Larson novel, which I hope to do.

* * *

Barb and I finally finished listening to – thanks to the Galena drive – the audio book of Do No Harm. What a terrific job Dan John Miller did! He especially nails famous defense lawyer F. Lee Bailey (who passed away recently).

You may recall my continued praise for one of my favorite movies, Anatomy of a Murder. There’s a terrific write-up about the film at AV Club here.

Kristen Lopez has a wonderful podcast called Ticklish Business on which I guested. We discussed the 1964 version of The Killers. I think you’ll enjoy this. Kristen and her equally young female cohorts Drea Clark and Samantha Ellis talk pop culture in a way that gives me hope for the future (there’s an emphasis on classic film).

Here’s a wonderfully insightful review of the paperback of Mike Hammer in Kiss Her Goodbye (with my original uncensored ending)

A “great Tom Hanks gangster movie just hit Netflix” – wonder what it is?

Here’s a terrific review of Two for the Money, the HCC two-fer of Bait Money and Blood Money.

M.A.C.

Tags: Awards, Bait Money, Blood Money, Kiss Her Goodbye, Krista and Keith Larson, Masquerade for Murder, Mickey Spillane, Mike Hammer, Nate Heller, Nolan, The Girl Can't Help It, The Girl Most Likely, True Detective, Two for the Money
Posted in Message from M.A.C. | 8 Comments »

Back to the Basement

Tuesday, June 1st, 2021

After fourteen months, my band Crusin’ had its first two post-lockdown rehearsals. The accompanying photo illustrating the current line-up was, appropriately, shot in my garage (though we practice in the nearby basement among thousands of books and DVDs).

CRUSIN’ 2021, left to right: Collins, Scott Anson, Steve Kundel, Bill Anson

We have three gigs lined up for our “season,” the first being July 4 at the Missipi Brew in the evening leading up to the fireworks. I’ll post the other dates here soon. And another gig or two may come through – we’ll see.

It was great being back with the guys – bittersweet, of course, after the passing of Brian Van Winkle, our longtime bass player. Our guitarist Bill Anson’s son Scott is our new bassist, but not all that new – Brian had stepped away from the band before our last pre-Covid gig, and Scott had been running sound and helping us load in and out for a couple of years. This is the first time we’ve had a father and son in the band, although drummer DeWayne Hopkins (who went on to be mayor of Muscatine) was followed in that role by his son, Jamie.

Both rehearsals went well, although all of us were rusty to a degree – not so much where playing was concerned, but in remembering chords and lyrics and the structure of arrangements. We had spent a lot of time in 2019 working on originals for one last CD, and were playing them on the job, but for now we’re tabling them. Without a CD to promote and sell, playing the originals seemed wrong somehow – we’re a classic rock band (a ‘60s/’70s/’80s variety) and audiences are not there to hear our originals.

We will still do a handful of our own songs this season, but next year we hope to be out there with a CD of original material, and possibly include the original songs from my movie Real Time: Siege at Lucas Street Market, which feature my late, longtime musical accomplice Paul Thomas on guitar, vocals, producing and songwriting.

In addition to being rusty, I admit to having some problems with my hands, specifically arthritis in my thumbs, which hasn’t impacted my typing (yet) but which did slow me down at the organ keyboard…my brain kept asking my fingers to do things to which my fingers replied, “Are you effing kidding?”

This leads me to suspect that next year – assuming I’m here and so is everyone else in the band (uh, I’m no longer the oldest person in Crusin’) – will be our farewell mini-tour with a CD the jewel (or jewel case, anyway).

Funny thing. I did not personally rehearse at all during those fourteen months. I have a Roland keyboard in my office and I occasionally played it, usually when I was watching a laserdisc of some vintage rock group (New Wave the newest) and wanted to see if I could figure out (or remember) the chords. But I stayed out of the band room in the basement, other than to retrieve a DVD. I had something akin to a mental block about it and I can’t explain why.

That Roland keyboard in my office I had ordered when I was recovering from my heart surgery with my right hand essentially useless after the operating-table stroke I suffered. That keyboard, in addition to Physical Therapy exercises and such, was my savior. Very early in the recovery process I realized I had enough minimal strength in my right hand and fingers to type on a computer keyboard, which can tolerate a very light touch. Hardest thing about that was my usual hammering-away left hand needed to cool it some to have both hands work effectively in tandem.

But it was playing the Roland keyboard that largely got the use of my hand back – muscle memory, I guess. But we had it set on the dining room table like an oddly-shaped meal and I would play it several half hours a day, just doing improv things, like the “Light My Fire” and “Evil Ways” leads.

As for why I didn’t rehearse during those fourteen months, I can’t explain it. I often thought about going downstairs to practice, but I never did. I do know that I have never been one to “jam” – I like the structure of playing a song. My late uncle Mahlon Collins was a terrific trombone player who in his retirement years lived in Los Angeles and played in some big bands out there with top players…people who backed Sinatra-type top players (also with Chris Christensen of Seduction of the Innocent!). And Uncle Mahlon said he was the same way. He admired the soloists but he read charts. He liked structure. Songs.

I’m not exactly that way, because my ability to read music is limited and mostly I know chords – an organ player, not a pianist. And I do solos all the time – a Hammond B-3-style organ is great for improv and for more structured solos, too. If anyone cares, my favorite keyboard players are Rod Argent, Mark Stein and Alan Price. (I play a Nord that works well as a B-3 clone and the new version of the VOX Continental, for combo sounds.)

But just playing to play – again, getting together to jam – is not my…jam. I don’t write songs unless there’s a project – an indie movie of mine that needs songs, a CD we’re doing, even the time my father asked me to write a song for him to dance with my mother at their 50th wedding anniversary (it was called “Patricia,” which was her name, and was a pretty good tune). I wrote a Christmas song for a concert my dad was doing with his men’s chorus one year.

However…without a reason, an assignment, I would never sit down and write a song just for the hell of it, the way real musicians do. My guitar player Bill Anson writes songs all the time and he worked diligently in his home studio rehearsing Crusin’ (and other) material all through those fourteen months. I haven’t written any songs since I wrote my half dozen or so for the CD (the rest will be by Bill, except for one we wrote together, called “Crusin’” for some reason, which we performed at the 2018 induction concert for the Iowa Rock ‘n’ Roll Hall of Fame).

I will say that – other than my arthritic thumbs protesting – I had no problem after fourteen months picking up where we left off. I always say – where my keyboard playing is concerned – I never knew enough to forget much.

* * *

Our first two-part Book Giveaway went very well – Barb and I sent out two boxes of books on Saturday. A few people got two books as we had some Antiques Fire Sale paperbacks left over.

We will probably have another giveaway next week.

I’m not trying to smother you people in pulp, it’s just that I have no control over publication dates. When a book comes out, I do a giveaway. Which means there may be several in the same month or two, or six months or more may pass between ‘em.

But I thank all of you who participate in these giveaways and we’re grateful for your reviews.

* * *

For some reason this video, in support of Scarface and the Untouchable by Brad Schwartz and me, has resurfaced. It’s on Fox Nation. [Photosensitivity warning: flashing lights]

Here is a swell review of Two for the Money, the Hard Case Crime combo of the first two Nolan novels, Bait Money and Blood Money.

And finally here is a fantastic review of Shoot-out at Sugar Creek from Bookgasm and Alan Cranis.

M.A.C.

Tags: Bait Money, Blood Money, Caleb York, Mickey Spillane, Reviews, Scarface and the Untouchable, Shoot-out at Sugar Creek, Two for the Money
Posted in Message from M.A.C. | 4 Comments »

Biggest Book Giveaway Yet, Boys and Girls!

Tuesday, March 23rd, 2021

This book giveaway may be my biggest yet.

Paperback:

I am offering ten copies each of Kiss Her Goodbye, Shoot-out at Sugar Creek, Two for the Money – these are all books that will be published in April.
Kiss Her Goodbye is a trade paperback from Titan of the third Spillane/Collins Mike Hammer novel, with my original, previously censored ending.

Shoot-out at Sugar Creek is the final Caleb York western being published by Kensington, although I hope to revive the series next year (probably with Wolfpack). This edition is a trade paperback the size of the hardcover and is an advance reading copy.

Two for the Money is a reprint of Hard Case Crime’s omnibus of the first two Nolan novels, Bait Money and Blood Money, with a new cover (the previous one being the rare HCC cover that disappointed).

[All copies have been claimed. Thank you for your support!–Nate]

You agree to write a review for Amazon and/or Barnes & Noble (and other review sites, blogs, etc.). This is the honor system, but Big Brother is watching. Or anyway I am.

Kiss Her Goodbye will be of interest to Mike Hammer fans because this is indeed the correct ending for the novel. My previous editor objected to what he considered too big a similarity to the ending of a classic Spillane title; he is a Spillane fan and expert, and I mean no disrespect to him – he was instrumental in getting Mike Hammer back out there – but I should not have given in to him and rewritten it.

So if you already have the hardcover, you still need to get the trade paperback. Yes, it’s double dipping, but there’s a new cherry on the sundae.

* * *

Barb and I are doing a Master Class via Zoom that is available to anyone interested.

DSM Book Festival: Sat. April 3
Workshop: Max Allan Collins at 9 a.m. (duration 1 hour)
Log-in: 8:40 a.m.

Workshop description:
Learn from the masters, Max Allan Collins and his wife Barbara Collins, as they each present their Top 5 Fiction Writing Tips and then field questions from the class. Together, Max and Barb have published the “Trash & Treasures” mystery series. Max is the New York Times bestselling and award-winning author of “Road to Perdition”, “True Detective,” the Quarry series, “Girl Can’t Help It” and many more.

Here’s the link: https://www.dsmpartnership.com/dsmbookfestival/attend/writers-workshops

They are taking registrations for until March 30.

* * *

Several classic films got watched around the Collins household this weekend.

First, one of my top ten turned up in high-def on TCM – Anatomy of a Murder. I watch this once a year, and am astonished by how caught up in it I get every time. It’s a perfect movie. Otto Preminger may have been a cruel taskmaster, but he made some great films (Anatomy the greatest, but Laura and Advice and Consent ain’t chopped liver, nor are a bunch of other films noir, and he pushed the censor’s envelope with Moon Is Blue and Man With a Golden Arm) (on the other hand…Skidoo).

James Stewart is at the top of his powers in Anatomy, and I am reminded that he was the greatest film actor of the 20th Century. That sounds like I’m stating a fact. I am. No one starred in, and propelled, more great films than Stewart. If you can top this list with your choice, feel free to try – Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, The Shop Around the Corner, The Philadelphia Story, It’s a Wonderful Life, Winchester ‘73, Harvey, Rear Window, Vertigo, Anatomy of a Murder, The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance).

And that’s just the great films. It doesn’t count the really good ones, like the other Anthony Mann films he made, or Bell, Book and Candle, or Rope, or Destry Rides Again, or The Man Who Knew Too Much, or Flight of the Phoenix, or The Shootist.

He made Vertigo, Bell, Book and Candle and Anatomy of a Murder right in a row – astounding. On my birthday Barb and I watched Vertigo in 4K in case I’d forgotten that it was my favorite movie. I would hate to have to choose between Vertigo and Anatomy of a Murder for Stewart’s best performance, and they are quite different, at that.

I love courtroom dramas and Anatomy is the best I’ve ever seen. It’s based on a novel by a lawyer (Robert Traver) and was itself based on a real murder case that lawyer won as a defense attorney. Boldly shot entirely on location, the film has a stunning, innovative jazz score by Duke Ellington and amazing opening credits by Saul Bass. For its day it was daring in its subject matter and frank expression thereof.

But perhaps what dazzles me most, every time I see it, is the intersection of two eras – Stewart as a Golden Age movie star going head to head with the Method crowd of Ben Gazzara, George C. Scott and Lee Remick. Gazzara and Remick are terrific in it, and Scott too…but Stewart owns the picture anyway. He is aided and abetted by two classic Hollywood supporting players – Eve Arden and Arthur O’Connell.

Two supporting performances stand out for me – Orson Bean, a personal favorite of mine (for The Star Wagon if nothing else), and Joseph Welch, Joe McCarthy’s real-life nemesis who, though an amateur actor, more than holds his own in this heady company.

Interestingly, another supporting player – Russ Brown – turned up in the second half of our amazing double feature this weekend – Damn Yankees (1958), on Blu-ray at last. Brown played the trainer of the Washington Senators in the great Broadway hit brought very faithfully to the screen by George Abbott and Stanley Donen. In the original show, Brown won a Tony as did Gwen Verdon and Ray Walston, and choreographer Bob Fosse.

Damn Yankees is one of the handful of Broadway musicals done justice by Hollywood – others include Li’l Abner, Pajama Game and How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying. Pajama Game was based on the novel 7 ½ Cents by Iowa novelist Richard Bissell (another personal favorite). Both Pajama Game and Damn Yankees (also from a novel, Douglas Wallop’s The Year the Yankees Lost the Pennant) had scores by Richard Adler and Jerry Ross, but tragically Ross died at age 29, leaving only these two great shows and a few pop songs as a nonetheless amazing legacy for the team.

The films of Damn Yankees and Pajama Game brought almost the entire Broadway casts along for the ride. Pajama Game replaced Janis Paige with Doris Day and Damn Yankees replaced Robert Shafer with Tab Hunter. Hunter gets a bad rap, sometimes, for his performance, but he’s quite good.

While I’m ruminating about (not quite reviewing) films I’ve seen recently, I should mention Zack Snyder’s Justice League, which lasts four hours plus and is streaming on HBO Max. This is an odd duck of a movie for many reasons. Director/writer Snyder left the original filming due to a family tragedy and Joss Whedon took over. Fans largely recoiled at Whedon’s version, which took a somewhat light approach to what had been conceived as a dark film. He re-shot most of it. I’ve often liked Whedon’s work, but his Justice League only looks good if you compare it to Wonder Woman 1984.

Snyder restored the material Whedon either cut or ignored of a film Snyder had shot 80% of, albeit minus most special effects. Fan pressure, amazingly, got Snyder the opportunity (i.e., the funding) to complete the film his way, and it’s better. Obviously over-long, but on its own quirky terms, it’s a super-hero epic worth seeing.

But quirky is right – for one thing, he presents the film in 4:3 ratio, which is to say, old-fashioned square TV format, apparently because that’s the I-Max format, even though not much of the film had been shot that way. Oh-kay….

And he got most of the cast back to film an apocalyptic dream sequence that ruins an otherwise acceptable epilogue. The dream sequence features ridiculously misjudged dialogue between Ben Affleck’s Batman and Jared Leto’s Joker (otherwise not in the film). How ridiculous? Batman talks about “fucking killing” Harley Quinn, and the Joker rhapsodizes about giving Batman a “reach-around.” Plus, it lasts a long time, right after we’ve sat through about four hours of capes and quips. Not okay.

Curiously, the film goes out of its way to set up the next film in the saga that Snyder would have made had Warner’s and DC not cancelled it. So rather than take the opportunity to bring his saga to a satisfying conclusion, Snyder tosses loose ends right and left, as if daring somebody to give him more money to keep going.

Nonetheless, I enjoyed it. I took the ride. I just wish I had turned it off when the dream sequence (initially not obviously a dream sequence, more a flash-forward) (including the Flash) gave a bad taste to a good time.

* * *

Here’s an interview I did with Brian Vakulskas on KSCJ radio in Sioux City, largely about the current Nolan novel, Skim Deep. The interviewer knew his stuff.

And here’s an advance look at the third Ms. Tree collection from Titan.

M.A.C.

Tags: Bait Money, Blood Money, Giveaways, Interviews, Kiss Her Goodbye, Mickey Spillane, Mike Hammer, Movie Reviews, Ms. Tree, Nolan, Shoot-out at Sugar Creek, Skim Deep, Two for the Money
Posted in Message from M.A.C. | 7 Comments »

Cover Story

Tuesday, January 26th, 2021

I had not been given an advance look at the Noir Alley episode this weekend that had me guest-presenting with Eddie Muller the great film noir, Born to Kill (1947) from the James Gunn novel, Deadly Is the Female. During the shoot, Eddie and I had talked about both the film and the book for maybe forty minutes, and the TCM editors honed it down beautifully. I am very pleased, and if it turns up on You Tube, I’ll share it here.

God, I love it when I don’t stink up the place!

Audible

Skim Deep has been getting some lovely notices, I am pleased to say, including great Amazon reviews, and readers seem to be pleased either to see Nolan again or meet him for the first time.

But due out a week from today is the first-ever audio book of Blood Money, the second Nolan novel, read by the amazing Stefan Rudnicki. As you may know, Hard Case Crime is bringing out a new trade paperback edition of Two for the Money, collecting the first two Nolan novels – Bait Money and, again, Blood Money – on April 20.

The Edgar nominations are out, and Eliot Ness and the Butcher did not receive a Best Fact Crime nom, just as Scarface and the Untouchable did not in its year. It’s frustrating that this major work – I consider these two books joined at the hip – has not been better recognized; but I am confident that what my co-author, A. Brad Schwartz, and I accomplished will have a lasting place in true-crime literature.

Both Reincarnal & Other Dark Tales and Shoot the Moon (And More) are available in trade paperback(and of course Kindle) from Wolfpack. I talked about Reincarnal last week and spoke of my pleasure in having my short horror fiction collected in one place. I’m excited to see Shoot the Moon published as a novel and not as part of a collection. Originally it was featured in the now out-of-print Early Crimes, and the two short stories from that collection are still included, but moved to the back of the book as a bonus feature.

Shoot the Moon is a novel written fairly early in my career, but after Bait Money, Blood Money, No Cure for Death, The Baby Blue Rip-off and Quarry. So it’s not an early work in the sense of being formative or from my college days. The two short stories that serve as a bonus are, in fact, from my community college days, although one of them (“Public Servant”) was considered good enough years later to be included in a Lawrence Block-edited anthology (Opening Shots).

As I’ve mentioned earlier, Shoot the Moon is to the Donald E. Westlake comic crime novels as Bait Money is to the Richard Stark un-comic crime novels. My debt to Don Westlake, as an inspiration and mentor, is one I can never adequately repay.

My son Nate encourages me to share behind-the-scenes stories and such about the writing life. So here I go….

Wolfpack is a very interesting outfit, because its publisher, Mike Bray, is something of a visionary, and its editor-in-chief Paul Bishop is a first-rate novelist himself who approaches publishing with an empathy and feel for his fellow writers.

I have been particularly pleased with the covers that have come out of Wolfpack, and yet a couple of problems turned up recently. As an example of the rampant political correctness that all creative people suffer these days, the cover of Reincarnal – which I love – was rejected for use in ads by Amazon. Fortunately, I’m told, ads for Facebook with that cover are still possible.

Apparently Reincarnal having a knife on its cover is the problem. I’ve run into this kind of thing before at several publishers, who haven’t wanted a gun on their covers. In one case, a publisher doing serial killer books – where the editor had me add a violent opening scene – did not allow guns or knives on their covers. Hey, I’m all for keeping guns off the floor of the House of Representatives and Senate – none of those people should be allowed around sharp objects – but on the covers of thrillers, horror novels and noir?

Who are we protecting with this prissy attitude, anyway?

Conversely, the wonderful cover of Come Spy With Me has taken some heat for being too classy, too subtle. And it does have a gun on it! That gun is on a beach covered in sand, which anyone whose favorite word isn’t “Duh!” will tell you was meant to make you think of the protagonist, John Sand. It’s possible we’ll eventually do a second cover for that title, when the third Sand novel, To Live and Spy in Berlin, emerges – a book Matt Clemens and I are plotting, having delivered book two, Live Fast, Spy Hard recently.

Wolfpack’s bread-and-butter has been what I used to hear called “boy books” by editors both male and female. “Boy books” are westerns, techno-thrillers, male-lead thrillers, private eye novels and noir (the latter will come as a surprise to Christa Faust and Megan Abbott). Westerns and men’s adventure-type novels, including spy stuff, do very well at Wolfpack, and while my work is at least vaguely in the “boy book” vein, I am part of the publisher’s effort to expand into new publishing realms. And I salute them for that.

“How can I help?” I hear you saying.

You can buy Reincarnal, Shoot the Moon, and Come Spy With Me for a start, and all the other titles of mine Wolfpack has been good enough to foist upon you lucky people.

At fear of kissing up (well, I’m not that afraid), I will say that Wolfpack, Hard Case Crime, Titan and the emerging Neo-Text are publishers who are allowing me to explore the genres and characters I care about, both old and new, and God bless them for it. Every one of them has invested their faith in me and my work in a way that goes well beyond the standard publishing approach of, “Well, we’ll throw one or two of your titles out there and see how they do.”

Publishers, notoriously, have laid all the blame on the writer for the lack of success of a book. We writers are where the buck stops, and you might say, “Of course you are!” But the truth is publishers are not in the book-selling business, they are in the cover-selling business. Hey, if my books aren’t packaged correctly, it’s not my effing fault.

Now, I have to cop to having loved some covers that didn’t work in the marketplace, and having hated some that did. But it’s not my job to package the books. I am busy writing them. I am hard at work making Wheaties. What athlete goes on the box isn’t my choice or my fault, which means I can’t take full credit for how many boxes of Wheaties fly off the shelves.

Publishers usually ask for a writer’s input into the covers, and then ignore that input, often for good reason. Hard Case Crime sends me the cover before I’ve even written the book, so I can work the scene into the narrative, like the old pulp writers used to – I get a perverse pleasure out of that. Thomas & Mercer gave me a lot of input into the covers, and I love the results. Those books continue to sell briskly.

But here is my dream. An editor has a series that has received glowing reviews, a series that said editor considers first-rate, though with a small but dedicated reader base, if not enough to justify publishing any more books in that series. Rather than drop that series like something icky, why not consider a re-packaging approach, and take a hard look at the marketing that has (or hasn’t) gone into it, and give that series a book or two more, with a new cover and new marketing approach, before deciding its ultimate fate?

That never happens.

Keeping Nate Heller alive through five major publishing houses, with a fifth coming, over almost fifty years is a small miracle – no, a big miracle, speaking to my own stubbornness and my only-child inability to be told “no.”

And yet. Here is Nolan back in print. Here is Quarry not only back in print but with me writing, right now, the tenth new book (Quarry’s Blood) in a series started back up again in 2006 when the damned thing had been declared dead in 1976.

* * *

J. Kingston Pierce’s The Rap Sheet, hands down the best mystery site on the web, has an edition of his entertaining column-within-a-column “Bullet Points” that has a nice paragraph about the book I’m writing now (Quarry’s Blood) and Heller.

Tags: Bait Money, Blood Money, Come Spy with Me, John Sand, New Releases, Nolan, Quarry, Quarry's Blood, Skim Deep, Two for the Money
Posted in Message from M.A.C. | 4 Comments »

Posts Tagged ‘Blood Money’

You Like Me, You Really Like Me!…Right?

Back to the Basement

Biggest Book Giveaway Yet, Boys and Girls!

Cover Story