Posts Tagged ‘Photos’

The Scarface and the Untouchable Show Hits the Road

Tuesday, August 28th, 2018

The recent mini-tour for Scarface and the Untouchable – with co-author Brad Schwartz as well as my other collaborator, Barbara Collins – went extremely well. Barb and I do very few signings these days, but all three of these – Saturday afternoon, August 18, at Read Between the Lynes in Woodstock (where both Chester Gould and Rick Fletcher lived), Sunday afternoon at Centuries & Sleuths in Forest Park, and Monday evening at Anderson’s Bookshop in Woodstock (where Dick Locher lived) – were well-attended and a lot of fun. Books were sold – plenty of them.

This was the first time Brad and I have done appearances together, and with no prep whatsoever, we were a team ready and willing to do this again and again. Brad is at ease in front of an audience and has a command of the facts that would have eluded me even at his, ahem, somewhat younger age than mine. Barb is also great with audiences, funny and comfortable with herself. Scarface took centerstage, but the Antiques series was not neglected.

To see how Brad and I interact (although I hog it a little here), check out our WGN appearance on the Monday morning of the Anderson’s signing.

And for a good write-up about the Centuries and Sleuths presentation, check out the Donald G. Evans piece on the event right here.

Several interesting things occurred. At Woodstock, a car show of vintage automobiles was in full sway around the quaint town square during our signing. The classic cars required parking places, and one such vehicle found a space right in front of the bookstore (one of the few such spaces remaining). That car had an Untouchables license plate belonging to its Ness enthusiast owner who had known nothing of the signing. He saw the signage about the book signing out front of Between the Lynes, came in to attend the event, and bought a book.

In Naperville, where Dick Locher’s wife Mary could not attend because of a club meeting at her home, the gracious Mrs. Locher had left for me a Sunday page original from early in the Locher/Collins run of Tracy. Dick had never got around to sending me an original for my office wall, and when he and I re-bonded a few years ago, he apologized and said he’d given all of his art to a university. He pledged to write and get one from them for me, but the university did not cooperate. For some time now, Mary had been looking through Dick’s materials to see if she could find anything for me. No luck. Then, before the signing in Naperville, she tried one more time…and found a page, a perfect example with plenty of Tracy and famous villains, as if it had been set aside by Dick himself for me. I found her gesture – and this posthumous gift from my Tracy collaborator – a thrill and quite touching.

Check out the photos below, then return for a few more links.


Brad, M.A.C., Barb

Brad looks on as M.A.C jokes with Bob Goldsborough.

Brad and “Barbara Allan”

M.A.C. discussing a variety of topics with the notorious Mike Doran.

M.A.C. speaking with David & Cynthia who traveled from McCordsville, Indiana.

Centuries and Sleuths

M.A.C. with Nero Wolfe author, Robert Goldsborough at Centuries and Sleuths.

Anderson’s in Naperville

Andserson’s in Naperville – readers lining up to get books signed after Brad and I spoke.

Anderson’s in Naperville

At Anderson’s in Naperville, Dick Locher’s wife Mary sent over a Sunday original from the Locher/Collins period of the strip

Brad and M.A.C. pose in Naperville with Dick Locher’s incredible Dick Tracy sculpture.

M.A.C. and Brad Schwartz at the downtown Woodstock, Illinois, Dick Tracy mural (featuring images from the Fletcher/Collins period of the strip)

Brad and M.A.C. signing at Between the Lynes Bookstore in Woodstock, Illinois.

M.A.C. and A.B.S. talk to a nice crowd at Between the Lynes bookshop in Woodstock, Illinois.

Brad and M.A.C. pose with Untouchable license plate on a fan of the show who just happened to pull in right in front of the book store where we were signing — and came in, taking time out from the car show on the town square, to listen to our presentation…and buy a book!

* * *

Attention for Scarface and the Untouchable continues, as this impressive New York Daily News spread indicates.

I am honored that Quarry has been chosen one of the top ten Greatest Men’s Adventure Series Ever in a November 2017 “highly-scientific and totally statistically valid poll” of 4,000 members of the Men’s Adventure Paperbacks Facebook Group. Richard Stark’s Parker came in first, followed by Matt Helm and Travis McGee, with Quarry coming in fourth. Heady company to be in.

Oddly, Mike Hammer did not make the list, but Killing Town scored a particularly fine review, right here.

M.A.C.

Bouchercon Photo Gallery

Tuesday, October 13th, 2015

Bouchercon at Raleigh, NC, was a blast. I’ll let these pictures (mostly taken by Gene George) tell the tale, but the event, as usual, was about as pleasant and fun as a work trip could be. The only frustrating thing is running into old friends – like Otto Penzler, Ted Hertel, Ted Fitzgerald, Bill Crider, Jeff Pierce, and Alan Turkus, among many others – and not having a chance to really sit down and chat with them. Various events, meeting and meals got me in touch with my agent and various editors and other publishing luminaries.

A highlight was the Shamus Awards banquet, at a very funky Southern-style restaurant, where I presented the best short story award (having won the year previous). The various nominees were mostly from noir collections gathering stories worldwide, giving me a chance to mispronounce almost every nominee’s name (in the case of Lawrence Block’s story, he thoughtfully provided me with a foreign name within the title).

M.A.C.

Bouchercon 2015
Max and Barb Collins on their first dual Bouchercon panel appearance.

Bouchercon 2015
Agent Dominick Abel, Max, Barb at the Shamus Awards Banquet.

Bouchercon 2015
Matt Clemens, Barb and Max signing in the book room.

Bouchercon 2015
Max, Kensington editor Michaela Hamiliton (standing), Barb

Bouchercon 2015
Max talking with his writer pal John Gilstrap.

Bouchercon 2015
Generations: Larry Block, Jason Starr, Max in book room.

Bouchercon 2015
Barb and Max display their Della Street and Paul Drake awards at the Shamus Banquet (earned by hosting last year’s event).

Bouchercon 2015
You’ve heard of THE TWO JAKES? This is the two Ted’s — Fitzgerald and Hertel.

Bouchercon 2015
M.A.C. at Forge ASK NOT signing.

New “Barbara Allan” Out This Week!

Tuesday, April 29th, 2014
Antiques Con

The day this update goes live, the new Barbara Allan – ANTIQUES CON – will be available. You should be able to find it at your favorite bookstore (and if they don’t have it, ask – but Barnes & Noble has been a big supporter of the series, so that’s a safe bet). And of course you can get it on line.

Those of you who got advance reading copies can now post a review on Amazon (and elsewhere).

One of the fun things about this one (commented upon by several reviewers) is that we begin with Chapter Two. The conceit is that our editor made us drop Chapter One because that chapter – dealing with the attempt to recover the paperweight that beloved Aunt Olive’s ashes had been turned into – had nothing to do with the mystery plot.

Well, you can read Chapter One, and for free, by going to our Barbara Allan web site.

The web site is a work in progress, with lots of fun stuff to come, but for now it’s already very cool (thank you, Nate!) with individual pages for each Barbara Allan book, including BOMBSHELL and REGENERATION. Many of the books have sample chapters, for those of you who haven’t dipped into the world of Barbara Allan as yet. Check it out!

To further celebrate, read this fantastic review from one of our favorite people (and favorite writers), Bill Crider.

Speaking of great reviews, here’s one that is about to appear in Booklist for SUPREME JUSTICE:

In the near future, the Supreme Court has reversed Roe v. Wade, strengthened the Patriot Act, and dismissed the Fourth Amendment. Devlin Harrison, the second African American president, is a liberal, but the court’s conservatives plan to outlast him. Then conservative justice Henry Venter is shot and killed in a D.C. restaurant. Enter former Secret Service Agent Joe Reeder, who took a bullet while guarding a president. Hailed as a hero, he made the mistake of expressing his opposition to that president’s neocon politics and quickly became a pariah. His only remaining federal-cop friend is FBI Agent Gabe Sloan, and Sloan, valuing Reeder’s insight, adds Reeder as a consultant to the multiagency task force investigating Venter’s murder. Soon a second conservative justice is killed, and the mastermind behind the crimes may be just getting started.

Collins (Ask Not, 2013), perhaps best known for his Nathan Heller novels, has crafted a spiky thriller with a fine inside-the-Beltway sensibility. His politics are transparent enough to cost him conservative readers, but the sense is that Collins is probably OK with that.

Here’s a LAST QUARRY review – better late than never.

Craig Zablo has posted a pic of Mickey and me. I wonder if he knows it was shot outside the Tower of London?

Here’s an interesting love/hate evaluation of series fiction in the mystery genre, with a brief but nice QUARRY mention.

MAC Iowa City Literary Walk

Speaking of Quarry, our images this week include shots of the structure honoring me as one of the authors on Iowa City’s Literary Walk (I am part of the Northside Marketplace expansion). This is particularly sweet to me, since as many of you know, I was kind of a black sheep at the Iowa Writers Workshop because of my insistence on writing crime fiction. Quarry was created when I was in the last semester of my MFA work at the Workshop, and the opening three chapters were “workshopped” to mixed reviews, mostly negative, including my instructor. My champion at the Workshop was the great mainstream writer Richard Yates – and his pedestal with quote was added to the walk at the same time as mine…how sweet is that? Writing well is the best revenge.

MAC Iowa City Literary Walk

M.A.C.

A Tale of Two Christmas Eves

Monday, December 24th, 2012

Here’s a piece about my two most memorable Christmases that I wrote recently for Bookreporter. Happy holidays, everyone, and thank you for your interest and support in 2012.

My ambition, from junior high school onward, was to be a mystery writer, specifically to write and publish the kind of hardboiled fiction people are calling “noir” these days.

I had written four novels in high school and a number of short stories, spending my summers creating the manuscripts that I would send out during the school year. I had any number of encouraging responses, but no sales.

At the University of Iowa Writers Workshop, I was blessed to have Richard Yates — the great mainstream author of REVOLUTIONARY ROAD — as my mentor. He helped me shape my pulp fiction into something that strove to be something more, even if it didn’t always. He got me an appropriate agent in New York, a crusty ex-paperback editor named Knox Burger, who said of my Raymond Chandler/Mickey Spillane-inspired work, “I’m afraid young Mr. Collins has learned to be a blacksmith in an automotive age.” Yates had told Burger that he thought I was another Dashiell Hammett. Burger said, “No — W.R. Burnett maybe.”

The story continues over at Bookreporter.com.

And here are pics from my appearance at Centuries and Sleuths in Forest Park, Illiniois, doing a Q and A at the Midwest MWA Christmas party on Dec. 16.

Before I sign off, here are a few links you might like to check out.

Here’s an interview I did about the Disaster series, in support of the current reprint program from Thomas & Mercer.

This is a well-done “get to know” me and my work from the fun site Mystery People.

The private eye-centric blog Sons of Spade has a nice TARGET LANCER review.

And here’s a very much appreciated positive review (and more) from the great Bill Crider about the forthcoming (February) SEDUCTION OF THE INNOCENT.

M.A.C.