If you’ve been looking for my daily Small Crimes report, apologies. Last week, my father, who lives with us, went to the emergency room. He’s now in overnight after-care and should be home by the end of the year. The daily posts will be on hiatus.
The big crime news last week was the death of John le Carré, one of the giants of crime fiction. I’ve put together a page of links to appreciations, obituaries, videos, interviews, etc earlier in the week and I am trying to keep it updated.
Another bit news is that we have reached the 30th anniversary of Walter Mosley’s “Devil in a Blue Dress”, one of the more important and great books of American crime fiction. Mosley’s wide-ranging essay lays down some truths about where America once was and where we are today. The lead character Easy Rawlins and his daily struggle are described by Mosley.
“He and his friends face every morning having to scramble up the slippery slope that is America, that is business as usual, that is an unequal sense of innocence and guilt, that recognizes and prejudges race, gender, and class before wondering about the who, what, and why of the crime committed. Easy is an American hero. He does not expect recognition, acceptance, or any sense of equality in the land that defines his experience as something other. He knows that he will never be seen as equal to those that believe equality is weighted by color and class, gender and belief. But Easy doesn’t care how he is seen or perceived; as long as they know he is blessed with the willingness to fight back, then the rules begin to tip, ever so slightly, in his favor.”
Features
I love this quote from Matthew Salesses’s new book, “Craft in the Real World” (Catapult, 2021): “Figure out what you want from publishing—a byline or community or enough money for groceries—and don’t feel like you have to follow someone else’s values.” You can read the review at Poets & Writers.
Benoît Lelièvre on the importance of Chuck Klosterman at Dead End Follies.
Daulton Dicky, author of “Flesh Made World”, on what experimental fiction gives to the writer and brings to the reader at Babou 691.
Everything you wanted to know about Tom Leins but were afraid to ask.
Exotic Indian poisons in pop culture by Aditi Sen at The Cultural Gutter.
Alex Segura interviews Ed Brubaker on the eve of his most recent collaboration with Sean Phillips, “Reckless”.
Scott Adlerberg is enjoying horror fiction during the dark winter nights of the pandemic especially “The Beckoning Fair One” by Oliver Onions.
Creative accounting, manipulated ethics, and late-stage capitalism. These are all things Disney. So while Alan Dean Foster and dozens more don’t get paid for their work, please enjoy the Marvel movies.
Bookshop.org may be fighting Amazon but destroying small publishers at New Statesman, h/t The Digital Reader.
Interview with Holly and Ryan Garcia, authors of “The Easton Falls Massacre: Bigfoot’s Revenge” (Close to the Bone, 2020).
Tara Laskowski’s “What Scares You” series continues with Kellye Garrett.
The First Two Pages: “You Know How Actresses Are” by C.M. Surrisi at Art Taylor’s blog.
A nice aggregation of best books lists at Literary Hub.
J. Kingston Pierce is a fan of the Cast of Characters.
Interview with Emily Schultz, author of “Little Threats” (Putnam, 2020) at Dietrich Kalteis’s blog.
LitReactor continues with its best book series with Part III.
The horror of Paris’s Grand Guignol Theater by Olivia Rutigliano at CrimeReads.
How two Oxford medievalists, JRR Tolkien and CS Lewis, saved fantasy by Maria Sachiko Cecire at Aeon.
Reviews
Review of “Beat Back the Tide” by Dolores Hitchens (Stark House Press, 1954/2020).
Review of Stephen J. Golds’s “Always the Dead” (Close to the Bone, 2021) at CrimeBookJunkie.
Review of Jess Lourey’s “Bloodline” (Thomas & Mercer, 2020) at BOLO Books.
Review of “Bloodline” by Jess Lourey (Thomas & Mercer, 2020).
Review of Edwin Hill’s “Watch Her” (Kensington Books, 2020) at BOLO Books.
Fiction
New fiction by Morgan Boyd at Punk Noir Magazine.
New fiction by Mark McConville at Bristol Noir.
New fiction by Phil Forsyth at Flash Fiction Magazine.
Shotgun Honey presents us with new flash fiction by Alan Orloff.
New flash fiction by Alpheus Williams at Bristol Noir.
New fiction by Jeff Esterholm at Tough.
MysterTribune gives us new flash fiction by Aeryn Rudel.
I love Paul D. Brazill’s weekly stories. This week we can read “The Bucket List” which is from his short story collection, “The Last Laugh” (All Due Respect, 2018)
New fiction by J.B. Stevens.
Two new pieces of flash fiction from Bobby Mathews at Bristol Noir and at Flash Fiction Magazine.
New flash fiction by Lawrence Allen at Shotgun Honey.
Christmas fiction by Tom Leins at Bristol Noir.
Christmas fiction at Punk Noir Magazine by Travis Richardson.
New Christmas fiction by Sally Spedding at Crime Cymru.
Ink Heist presents a new horror story by Laurel Hightower.
New fiction by Roy Christopher at Close to the Bone.
New flash fiction from Matthew Spence at Pulp Modern.
New flash fiction by Alexa Hailey at Ellipsis Zine.
Beat to a Pulp returns with new fiction from Kieran Shea.
New fiction by James A. Reeves at Vol. 1 Brooklyn.
New fiction from Judith Barrow at Crime Cymru.
Three new poems by Jay Passer at Punk Noir Magazine.
Poetry
The Five-Two presents new poetry from Nancy Scott.
Live Nude Poems has new poetry by Melissa Eleftherion.
Poetry by Carrie Magness Radna at The Rye Whiskey Review.
Punk Noir Magazine has poetry by Kristin Garth.
New poetry by Mickey J. Corrigan at The Rye Whiskey Review.
Punk Noir Magazine presents three new poems by Dan Provost.
The Rye Whiskey Review featuring new poetry by Ian Lewis Copestick.
Podcast
Frank Zafiro interviews Bruce Robert Coffin, author of “Within Plain Sight” (Witness Impulse, 2020) at Wrong Place Write Crime.
Film
A look back at David Cronenberg’s “Crash” (1996) at We Are Cult.
Andrew Nette’s series on Donald Westlake’s Parker films continues with “Payback Straight Up” (2006) at Pulp Curry.
Music
Review of Alison Self’s “Whiskey Drunk” at Post to Wire.
No Depression’s Best Music Books of 2020.
An appreciation of Charlie Pride at The Paris Review.
Review of Sturgill Simpson’s “Cuttin’ Grass Vol. 2” at Saving Country Music.
Art and Photography
Photographer Lori Garnes interviewed by Amy M. Vaughn at Babou 691
Fragments of Noir presents some photography by Clemens Kalischer.
Photographs by Alex Prager at Fragments of Noir.
The Big Lonely City photography series continues at Fragments of Noir.
All Due Respect is accepting short story submissions. We’d love to publish more stories from women, writers of color, and other marginalized voices. We pay $25 upon publication. Submission guidelines here.